


Mélange a trois

by LennaNightrunner, Savannah_Clover



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Romance, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Multi, Mutual Pining, Polyamory, Slow Burn, Threesome - F/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-24
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:20:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 104,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25496728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LennaNightrunner/pseuds/LennaNightrunner, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Savannah_Clover/pseuds/Savannah_Clover
Summary: Now that the horror that was high school in Beacon Hills is over, Malia is ready to begin a new chapter in her (mostly) human life, and she thinks Paris is the place to start. Chris Argent has even been kind enough to let her stay in his old apartment. It isn’t until she arrives, however, that she remembers another member of Scott’s pack already lives there. Isaac has been working on his own new chapter, and was doing just fine until the coyote girl he helped rescue shows up on his doorstep, bringing with her pieces of his past. Pieces which include a certain previously demon-possessed boy who has plagued Isaac’s thoughts for longer than he’d like to admit. Isaac, Malia, and Stiles soon discover that new chapters have their own conflicts, and that they might have to stop running from their past in order to ensure that they’ll have a future.(Roughly canon-compliant through the entirety of the TW series through season 6A, when Malia plans to go to France, with some speculations and modifications.)
Relationships: Isaac Lahey/Malia Tate, Isaac Lahey/Stiles Stilinski, Isaac Lahey/Stiles Stilinski/Malia Tate, Stiles Stilinski/Malia Tate
Comments: 51
Kudos: 78





	1. Chacun voit midi à sa porte / Each Person Sees Noon at Their Door

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Malia wants a change and Isaac receives an unexpected guest.

MALIA

“What are you doing here?”

Malia’s words were echoed by a tall blond boy-- _werewolf_ , she corrected herself when she noted his gold eyes and caught his scent--who was standing in the doorway, aiming a crossbow at her.

“I live here,” the boy said at the same time Malia said, “Chris Argent said I could stay here.”

After a tense moment, the boy cocked his head to the side, as if he was still considering shooting Malia even though she had a perfectly good reason for being there. Then he took a couple of deep breaths, and his eyes shifted from gold to a human shade of blue. He lowered the crossbow.

“You’re that coyote girl.”

“What makes you think that?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest in a stance that her therapist called _defensive_. The boy didn’t _seem_ dangerous, but Malia didn’t like surprises, and she _definitely_ didn’t like being at a disadvantage. A werewolf could raise a crossbow and shoot it a lot faster than a human could. Luckily, a were-coyote could also uncross her arms and knock a crossbow out of a werewolf’s hands pretty quick, too.

“Your scent,” the boy said in a tone that Malia was learning to identify as _casual_ , though she could be wrong. “I tracked you when your dad was trying to kill you. My leg got caught in a bear trap. It hurt. A lot.”

“Obviously, you healed,” said Malia. Even if he was telling the truth, she wasn’t going to feel sorry for someone who’d been stupid enough to get himself caught when she’d had no problem avoiding those traps.

“Who are you?” she asked him when all he did was stare at her.

“Isaac.”

A few scraps of conversation sparked in Malia’s memory. Scott and the others talked about a beta named Isaac every now and then, but it usually ended up with everyone else looking sad and Malia confused, and then someone changed the subject.

“You’re one of Scott’s betas.”

“I guess.” Isaac shrugged and looked away from her. She identified the emotion in the gesture: discomfort. “Kind of.”

“Me, too,” said Malia. “Kind of.”

Isaac didn’t say anything to that. He just fiddled with something on the crossbow. Fidgeting. That also sometimes meant discomfort, and now Malia was starting to feel it, too. She wondered if Isaac was going to tell her to leave or invite her in. Both seemed equally likely to happen, and from the way Isaac was stalling, Malia guessed he wasn’t sure either.

Malia didn’t care. It wasn’t his decision. So she hiked up her way-too-big backpack higher on her shoulder and waited.

Finally, Isaac looked up, meeting her eyes with… resignation? Maybe? In any case, it looked like he wasn’t going to challenge her or try to shoot her, which was the important thing.

“Why are you here?” he asked.

Malia considered her answer for a moment. There wasn’t any risk in telling him, she decided. There wasn’t much of a story to tell anyway.

“Beacon Hills is boring and people keep dying all the time. I don’t want to be there anymore.”

Isaac gave her a look that was even harder to read than his other expressions. Malia had been getting better at reading _looks_ and tones of voices over the past few months, but this guy made her feel like she’d unlearned all of that. Even his scent wasn’t giving anything away. She was beginning to feel _discomfort_ again.

After a few seconds, Isaac shrugged again. “Fair enough.”

He didn’t exactly step to the side to let Malia in, but he didn’t try to stop her when she pushed her way past him into the apartment. In the past she might’ve been wary of invading someone else’s den, but it wasn’t _Isaac’s_ territory; it was _Chris’s_. And he’d given her permission to stay here. She heard Isaac shut and lock the door behind her. Since her senses didn’t tell her that having him at her back was a threat, she didn’t turn around at the sound. And since she’d figured out that locked doors were a better deterrent for keeping things _out_ of dens rather than _in_ them, she even found the sound comforting.

There were two bedrooms in the apartment. The first one smelled like Isaac, so Malia dropped her camping backpack (her dad had insisted she needed it if she was going to be traveling around Europe) next to the bed in the other one, which smelled very faintly of Chris but mostly just dust. It was a nice room, with a large window that let a lot of light in and had an impressive view of the city. Malia found herself smiling. She liked this room.

She was also exhausted. It wasn’t just the jet lag, though that was annoying, and the long plane rides had been very uncomfortable. It was… well, _everything_. Malia hadn’t really relaxed in a long time. Since she’d decided not to be with Stiles anymore, or maybe even before that. Now, away from Beacon Hills--where they were always being hunted, or hunting, or both--she _finally_ had nothing to worry about. 

So without even bothering to close the bedroom door or take off her boots, Malia crawled onto the bed and curled up on the slightly musty comforter.

She was asleep in the space of a minute.

* * *

ISAAC

_Me: Could’ve given me a heads-up_

_Chris: If I’d told you she was coming, what would you have said?_

Isaac stared down at his phone, considering his response to Chris’s text. He would’ve told Chris he didn’t want the coyote girl here.

Or would he? What right did he have to do that? As so often happened, a pang of guilt hit Isaac’s stomach at the reminder that Chris was letting Isaac live rent-free in a very nice apartment in a very expensive part of Paris. Another message appeared before he’d decided what to say.

_Chris: It’ll be good for you to learn to share_

Isaac could practically hear the smugness in Chris’s voice as he read the words. He rolled his eyes at his phone. Chris always seemed to know how to turn Isaac’s guilt--even when Isaac didn’t actually express it--into motivation. It had taken Isaac a while to realize that Chris had been doing it on purpose. A lesson in compartmentalizing.

Isaac took advantage of the opportunity to compartmentalize too by texting, _What’s her name?_

_Chris: You didn’t ask her?_

_Me: I almost shot her_

_Chris: Crossbow?_

_Me: Yeah_

_Chris: Good. Clearly I trained you well_

Isaac snorted. He definitely couldn’t contest Chris’s claim. The hunter’s training sessions, especially early on, were another compartmentalization tactic: work your body into the ground and you end up too exhausted to be kept awake by grief. And excruciatingly sore muscles and bruises (even a werewolf didn’t heal immediately) made you focus on physical pain rather than the agonizing hole in your heart. Isaac quickly learned why Chris was still in such excellent shape.

_Me: Then she fell asleep on your bed_

_Chris: It’s her bed now_

_Me: For how long?_

_Chris: For as long as she wants it_

It was the answer Isaac had been expecting, but he still wasn’t thrilled about it. He’d been enjoying living alone, and he wasn’t sure how having a were-coyote living in his--in _Chris’s_ \--apartment would affect his routine. Routine was important when you were trying to forget pain. Routine meant a lower chance of sitting and thinking about things he didn’t want to think about.

 _Okay_ , he typed, because there wasn’t another appropriate answer.

_Chris: Malia’s had a rough time. Be nice to her_

Malia. That was her name. Isaac remembered now. It was a nice name, pleasant to hear and to say. It clashed with the blunt, pushy girl in mismatched clothing and combat boots passed out in the next room. 

_Me: A hard time kinda comes with the territory when you’re a literal monster_

_Chris: Her birth father is Peter Hale_

…Oh.

_Me: Oh_

_Chris: Yeah. So behave yourself_

Isaac felt himself smile. He could hear the exact tone of Chris’s voice in his head.

_Me: Don’t I always?_

_Chris: You want me to answer that truthfully?_

Isaac’s smile deepened ever-so-slightly.

_Me: Okay, okay, I’ll try to be nice_

_Chris: Good boy. We’ll talk soon_

_Me: Okay. Bye_

Isaac put his phone down on the kitchen counter and sighed deeply. He went to Chris’s-- _Malia’s_ , now--bedroom and peeked inside. She was still fast asleep, but Isaac had the feeling that if he got too close to her she’d have her claws at his throat within seconds. Wild animal instincts didn’t just disappear. So Isaac shut her door and went to the living room to hang his crossbow back on the wall near the front door.

Well. This would be interesting.

* * *

MALIA

When Malia woke up it was dark. It took her a few panicked seconds to remember where she was. She didn’t recognize any of the scents in the unfamiliar room, and--Malia’s nose caught a slight trace of someone that triggered a memory. _Chris_. This was Chris Argent’s apartment. She was in Paris. Malia sat up and took a few deep, steadying breaths.

The bedroom door opened and a beam of light spread over the floor, with a man’s silhouette in it.

“You okay?” the man asked. The boy. Isaac.

“Yeah,” Malia answered groggily. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Pulse,” he said simply. “Hungry?”

Malia opened her mouth to say no, but then she caught a whiff of something cooking and her stomach rumbled loudly.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” There was something in the tone of his voice. Amusement?

With hunger overriding tiredness now, Malia reluctantly crawled out of bed and followed Isaac--and the delicious scent--to the kitchen. She sat at a bar that doubled as a counter from the other side, where Isaac had set two places: silverware, plates, cups, napkins. Isaac took the plate in front of Malia and served up some kind of food onto it before placing it back in front of her. It smelled incredible. Some kind of meat--Chicken?--in a sauce with various vegetables on the side. Malia was going to ask what the meat was, but it smelled so good she didn’t care. She quickly cut herself a piece of it.

The sound of pleasure she made while chewing the first bite was apparently funny to Isaac. He didn’t quite laugh out loud, but there was this closed-mouth sound in his throat and behind his nose, and his eyes were smiling. It had taken Malia _forever_ to figure out that people could smile with their eyes. 

“Good?” he asked, like he didn’t know the answer.

Malia swallowed quickly. Stiles had told her that it was rude to talk while you were eating. “Amazing. What is it?”

“Duck. They like duck here.”

“Guess I like it, too,” said Malia, then continued eating. She wasn’t really interested in the vegetables, but she tried them because it was the _polite_ thing to do. They were actually really good, especially when she smeared them through the extra sauce on her plate.

Malia was already halfway done with her dinner when Isaac filled his own plate and sat down next to her at the bar. Well, not quite next to her; he left a seat between them. Malia wondered if that was for his benefit or hers. Was he feeling discomfort again? Usually people kept space between each other if they felt uncomfortable or threatened, or they were trying to keep other people from feeling that way. It had taken Malia a very long time to learn the concept of _personal space_.

When she’d finished eating, she turned to Isaac and gave him a sincere “Thank you.”

Isaac shrugged and swallowed a mouthful of food. “I was already making some for myself.”

He kept his eyes looking away from hers even when they were talking to each other. Eye contact was very, very tricky. Stiles had said you were supposed to _look at_ people when they were talking to you because that was polite, but not _stare_ at them, because that made some people uncomfortable. Malia had decided that that was something that was too hard to try to get right, so she’d given up on it. Some people were always going to feel uncomfortable around her. She could live with that. She didn’t really care what most people thought about her.

“Yeah, well. Thanks anyway.”

* * *

ISAAC

After being on his own for well over a year, Isaac wasn’t sure how he felt about someone else being in his space--because despite what Chris had said earlier, this was most definitely _Isaac’s_ space. It was the only place he’d ever lived where someone hadn’t hit him or thrown him against a wall or thrown a glass at him, and that was sort of important to Isaac.

Not that he worried about this girl attacking him. It was just… Well… Isaac might have been a little… _nervous_ about living with someone again.

Even the times that Chris had been living in or visiting the apartment, Isaac had never really been able to get completely comfortable. At least Chris had never seemed all that comfortable either. It was probably weird for him to be living with his dead daughter’s sort-of-not-really boyfriend, which had strangely made Isaac feel better. They got along best when they were training, and they _never_ talked about their feelings, and for the most part they were able to cohabitate without Chris acting too much like a dad or Isaac acting too much like a moody teenager. But it was still kind of awkward sometimes, and it had always been a relief when Chris would be gone for weeks or months for work.

Now there was someone in Isaac’s space again--someone who hadn’t even been here a full day, and he was already cooking for her.

It was true that Isaac had already planned on cooking for himself anyway, but still. The domesticity of it had had Isaac pacing the kitchen while he had waited for the oven timer. He hadn’t even been sure if he’d be able to make himself eat until the coyote girl-- _Malia_ \--had made that first overly enthusiastic moan of satisfaction. As Isaac had prepared his own plate, he’d realized that what he’d really been nervous about was disappointing her. Someone from Beacon Hills had only just arrived and Isaac was already in danger of falling back on old habits. And fuck if that wasn’t pressure that Isaac didn’t need in his life again.

Luckily, that didn’t seem to be the case, if the way Malia was practically licking the plate clean beside him was any indication.

“There’s plenty if you want more,” Isaac finally said, nodding his chin towards the pans on the stove. “I make enough for leftovers since I don’t have time to cook real food on weekdays.”

“Why not?” Malia asked.

Isaac pushed the last few bites of veg around on his plate. “I have a job.”

“What?” Malia’s nose eyebrows and nose crinkled in confusion. “Why?”

“Chris is letting me live here for free but I still have to buy food and other stuff, and I pay the bills.”

Malia frowned. “He never said anything to me about bills.”

Isaac picked up his plate and carried it to the sink. “He probably figures you won’t be here very long.”

Malia followed suit, standing just a little too close beside Isaac while he rinsed off his plate.

“If you don’t want me here, just say so.”

“I literally don’t care.”

Isaac flinched inwardly at his own rudeness. The way he was talking to this girl was just like he used to behave around people a year ago. He’d worked hard to get over that, to be better, and one person speaking English with a California accent had immediately set him back.

Malia squinted her eyes at him, like she was trying to see the blood in his veins instead of listen to it. Either way, she wasn’t going to be able to tell if Isaac was lying or not. Since becoming a werewolf and realizing that it was possible to hear a lie, Isaac had practiced keeping his pulse steady. He was tired of people getting inside his head.

“Besides,” Isaac continued after finishing with his plate and taking hers out of her hands, “something tells me you’d stay anyway just to be obstinate.”

“Stiles always did that to me, too,” said Malia, crossing her arms over her chest. “He’d use all these big words for no reason. Why’re there so many words that mean the same thing?”

Isaac set the second plate in the drying rack and reached past Malia for the hand towel he kept draped over the oven handle. She didn’t back up to give him space.

“It means stubborn,” he said.

“Don’t be patronizing. I know what it means.” Malia rolled her eyes in what Isaac could only describe as a very Stiles fashion. It wasn’t as effortless on her, but strangely enough, the effort she put into it made it almost charming. And now he was further associating this girl with Stiles. Great.

“I wasn’t--” he started.

“Look, I’m not an idiot,” said Malia. “I get that Scott probably asked Chris to put me here with you so you could babysit me or whatever. I might not understand math and Stiles’s stupid ‘social norms,’ but I don’t need you or anyone else to take care of me. In case you forgot, I was on my own for a long time and I did just fine.”

“As a coyote,” Isaac couldn’t help but add.

She flashed electric blue eyes--unsettlingly similar to Derek’s after he’d given up his alpha status--and, as though just realizing their proximity, turned and stalked back to her seat at the bar, putting the countertop between them. It was clear that she’d interrupt Isaac again if he said anything, so he waited for her to continue.

“I came here to see the Eiffel Tower and walk the Seine and once I’m done with Paris I’ll go to Amsterdam or London or Berlin or wherever the hell I feel like and there’s nothing that you or Chris or Scott or my dad can say to change my mind.”

Isaac frowned, suddenly feeling like an asshole for forgetting that Malia had an overprotective adoptive father and a psychopathic birth father. Her blue eyes, too, were a reminder that Malia’s “issues” went way beyond the paternal figures in her life. Isaac hung the towel back up before crossing his own arms and leaning back against the sink facing her across the bar. 

“You’ve got daddy issues, too, huh?” he said in a tone he hoped came off as light.

Malia just blinked at him. Isaac couldn’t tell if that meant she didn’t understand what he was talking about, or if she didn’t appreciate him making light of her feelings. If she wanted sincere empathy, Isaac was the wrong person for the job. But that didn’t mean he had to be a dick about it.

“I just meant I get it if you do. In case no one back home mentioned it, my dad used to hit me and lock me in a freezer. Not trying to one-up your trauma or whatever, just putting it out there.” 

There was an awkward pause during which Malia regarded Isaac like she had no idea what to make of him.

Finally, she spoke: “It’s not like that. He just… He just worries _so much_ ,” she insisted, a note of exasperation entering her tone. “Like, about _everything_. He didn’t want me to leave.”

“Again.”

The word tumbled from Isaac before he’d realized he was going to say it. Talk about daddy issues: Isaac’s were tangled up in abandonment issues, too. He knew that about himself, and he hated it, and it was why he’d fought so hard to be okay on his own. If you were the one who left, no one could leave you. For the first time, Isaac felt sorry for Malia’s dad. He’d lost literally everyone he loved, and he’d miraculously gotten one of them back, and he was so scared he’d lose her again that he was making her resent him. That had to be rough.

Malia went very still, her voice quieter when she said, “What?”

Isaac held her gaze even though her body language was becoming less confident by the second. 

“He didn’t want you to leave _again_.” He tried to keep accusation out of his tone, conscious that she hadn’t _meant_ to leave her father, and that she genuinely loved him and didn’t want to hurt him. “He lost you for like half your life. He’s probably worried you won’t come back this time.”

* * *

MALIA

Malia’s chest felt tight, her face hot.

People could say what they would about how spending so many of her formative years as a coyote had “hampered her development,” at least Malia had learned how to take care of herself. Just not the way her dad thought that she needed to.

Just because he thought she’d been a human the whole time didn’t mean it was fair for him to treat her like she was helpless. 

Now that she _was_ human again (or at least in her human shape most of the time), he was constantly worried that she wasn’t human _enough_. He’d finally given up trying to drop “tactful” hints about how teenaged girls were “supposed” to behave--buying her razors and leaving glossy magazines that talked about _fashion_ on her desk. He told her once in the family counseling sessions they’d been “strongly advised” to attend that he was worried that he was failing her as a dad. He worried that she just didn’t feel comfortable shopping for bras and make-up and whatever with him around. But the truth was she just didn’t care about that stuff, so why should she bother? 

The therapist had even agreed with Malia, although she’d tied it up with words like “positive body-image” and “unhealthy social norms,” which Malia didn’t care about but did seem to help her dad “understand” Malia better. And it was nice that her dad loved her so much he cared a lot about understanding her, but that just wasn’t going to happen, and they both knew it. Malia’s dad was always sad or uncomfortable with her around. Why not make it easier on both of them and just not be around?

But considering the fact that she hadn’t even told her therapist--a person who was literally paid to force Malia to talk about her feelings--about thinking that her dad might be happier if she left, Malia definitely wasn’t going to talk to _Isaac_ about it. She didn’t care what his “daddy issues” were. He should mind his own business.

Malia glared at the werewolf. “Why do _you_ care if I go back or not?”

She almost missed the way that Isaac rolled his eyes as he turned toward the cupboard. “I don’t.”

Isaac pulled out several Tupperware dishes and lids and set to work putting the leftovers from dinner away. “Just saying, not everyone has someone who cares about them and wants them to be safe.”

The derisive noise (Scott had taught her that word while practicing for this weird test thing everyone was supposed to take for college) made its way out of Malia’s mouth before she could even think to stop it. “Yeah, it’s _great_ having people try to control your life and tell you it’s for your own good.” She nearly growled at Isaac’s back. “Are _you_ ever going back?”

Malia watched as Isaac seemed to force himself to relax his shoulders, even though his heart rate stayed the same even pace that it had been since he’d opened the door earlier. It was nice to see him have some kind of reaction, even if it wasn’t one that gave her any kind of insight into what he was thinking.

Isaac snapped the last Tupperware lid shut and put the containers into the fridge before he looked at Malia again. He wasn’t glaring back at her, but his gaze was intense enough that Malia almost found herself missing how he’d looked away from her on purpose before when he was uncomfortable.

“I have a life here. A _job_.” Isaac leaned back against the fridge and crossed his arms again. _Defensive_. “My parents are dead and I was never good having a pack or a girlfriend or anything. If you don’t want to go back, don’t go back. But you don’t get to come here playing tourist and act like your baggage is heavier than mine.”

Werewolf dynamics were easier for Malia to understand than human ones, mostly because they behaved according to their animal instincts. They weren’t exactly like coyotes, but they were close enough to make sense to the animal in Malia. When humans stared, it could mean a lot of things. When werewolves stared, it was always a power play. Malia forced herself to hold Isaac’s gaze because dropping it would’ve meant that she was admitting that Isaac was stronger than she was. Her inner coyote defiantly insisted she could take him in a fight.

Except when Isaac looked away, it was a very human gesture that said he didn’t care, not a sign of werewolf submission. It didn’t make sense at all. Which rules was Isaac playing by?

“What do you want from me?” Malia growled, angry and frustrated with this strange boy who confused both her human and coyote sides.

Isaac tipped his head back, knocking it gently against the fridge. “Nothing. I just live here. You came to me.”

“I came to _Paris_ ,” Malia corrected him. “Chris didn’t tell me you’d be here.”

“Same,” said Isaac. He took a deep breath, then sighed it out, dropping his head to look at her again. Malia had been ready to argue more, but Isaac suddenly seemed uninterested in that. “I’m not going to play ‘I was here first.’ It’s Chris’s place. You don’t need my permission to stay.”

“I didn’t ask for it,” Malia couldn’t resist adding. There was something satisfying about getting the last word that Malia didn’t quite understand, but she always tried for it.

Isaac only shrugged in response before grabbing a bottle of wine and a glass, and turning to leave the kitchen.

Ha!

* * *

ISAAC

Of all the things Isaac didn’t miss about Beacon Hills, needing to belong to a pack was right at the top of his list. Malia wasn’t a wolf, but the way she was acting made it clear that she’d spent a lot of time treating Scott like an alpha and his betas like packmates, and Isaac didn’t appreciate her bringing that bullshit here. He didn’t have the patience for it anymore.

The good thing was that it was pretty hard to have a pack with just two wolves--well, a wolf and a coyote. No pack meant no need to play stupid dominance games. The sooner Malia realized that she was a pack-less animal again, the better for both of them. And if she didn’t like it, she could go back to Beacon Hills.

Isaac wondered if he should warn Malia not to try that shit with any other werewolves she might come across on her trip, but even the short amount of time he’d spent with her made it clear that she probably wouldn’t listen anyway, so he might as well save his breath. 

Which meant there was clearly nowhere else for that conversation to go, and since Malia very obviously wasn’t going to drop it, Isaac realized he was going to have to let her have the last word and end it. Which he thought he’d done, until he realized that Malia had followed him out of the kitchen.

“What?” Isaac asked, turning to face her. He didn’t have the time or the energy for a shadow, especially after their argument, or whatever the exhausting exchange qualified as.

Malia pulled up short, clearly surprised that he’d stopped. “I don’t know.” She gestured to the window. “It’s night. I thought people went out or whatever at night.”

“People who don’t have to get up early, maybe.” Relieved that she wasn’t trying to start their previous conversation up again--Why did so many people want to talk about their _feelings_ all the time?--Isaac went into the living room. “If you feel like going out, you can take my keys.” He gestured to where they were hanging by the door. “I need them back before I leave in the morning. Not sure if Chris left another set.”

He slid over the back of the couch and landed on the plush leather cushions in a move that would have gotten his ears boxed as a kid but now just helped remind him that he was an adult. He drank wine for the same reason. Well, that and it tasted amazing once he’d taken the time to learn about how all the flavors both stood out and came together. Isaac tugged the cork out of the already half-empty bottle of red he’d brought from the kitchen and poured himself a glass. 

Isaac heard rather than saw Malia enter her bedroom. She was gone for less than a minute before she was back standing behind the couch. Without looking up, Isaac could feel her watching him with unsettling focus.

Only after he was settled with his back against the arm of the couch and his feet stretched out across the cushions did he bother to look up at Malia with a single raised eyebrow.

“Yes?” he asked, regretting it before he’d even opened his mouth. He didn’t want to keep talking. He wanted to have a couple of drinks, maybe listen to some music or watch a movie, and go to bed. Isaac rarely had nights where he wasn’t doing his coursework and he had wanted to enjoy it. He didn’t like the way that his schedule had been thrown off by this unexpected houseguest.

Almost like she could read his thoughts, Malia narrowed her eyes and marched over, flopping down in one of the armchairs across from the couch. She had a book in her hands, one of those books tourists swore by and people who really lived in a place scoffed at. Malia was holding on to it like it was more precious than platinum.

“I won’t get in your way,” she said. “You don’t have to cook for me or clean up after me. I don’t want you to.” 

Man, this girl was _intense_. Was that the right word for it? She was blunt, which Isaac sort of liked in a grudging way. He just wasn’t used to it. People in Paris were a lot more direct and less worried about politeness than people in the States, but they weren’t direct in the way that Malia was. There was a fine line between being honest and having no filter.

Isaac took a long sip from his glass before asking, “Do you like wine?”

Malia looked at Isaac like he was crazy. “What?”

“You can get a glass from the kitchen,” he continued, figuring that she’d definitely heard him and just didn’t understand the sudden change of topic. “And I have another bottle on top of the fridge.”

When Malia just kept sitting there, staring at him, Isaac groaned. “Have a drink with me or leave me alone.”

That seemed to do the trick because Malia immediately stood up and marched out of the room and into the kitchen. While she was gone, Isaac turned on the stereo system that Chris had left behind and which was already tuned to his favorite Parisian radio station. Since he’d come to France, Isaac had spent quite a bit of his time listening to French music and DJs in order to help immerse himself in the language. Isaac had spent most of his time trying to be invisible in social situations, and apart from his ill-advised overconfidence in the weeks following his dad’s death, he tended to default to that position. It was hard to blend in if you didn’t speak the local language.

Malia returned a minute later with her book tucked under her arm, a glass in one hand, and the other bottle of wine in the other. She seemed to all but collapse on the floor between the coffee table and the couch but still managed to set everything down on the table without doing any damage. Isaac held back an involuntary chuckle at Malia’s seemingly unintentional reckless grace and reached over to pour her a glass from the already open bottle.

He could tell immediately, even with her facing away from him, that Malia was not a fan of wine. She paused after taking the first sip, but when Isaac expected a comment or a question, Malia stayed surprisingly quiet. She seemed to steel herself before her next drink, which was more of a desperate gulp than a sip, before settling back against the couch near Isaac’s hip and opening her travel book on the table. 

Over her shoulder, Isaac could see that more than a few pages had been dogeared or marked up with a variety of colors. He found himself wanting to ask her what the different colors meant, or where she planned to go first, but couldn’t quite bring himself to be the one to shatter the tentative peace they’d finally managed to cultivate. So instead, he just turned up the music and watched her read.

It was later than he’d realized by the time Isaac finally stood up and stretched.

“Well, you might be jet lagged, but I need to sleep.”

Malia stood up too. “Oh, right. Work. You never actually told me what you do.”

He left their glasses and the now empty bottle and a half on the table. He could deal with them tomorrow. Another perk of being an adult. “I take classes and I work at an after-school program for kids.”

That got him a raised eyebrow. 

"So, you're a… teacher?"

"Not yet." Isaac said with a shrug. "But I’m majoring in education, so, maybe someday?"

“You’re going to school _while_ you’re teaching school? That doesn’t make sense.”

“I’m just an assistant.”

“I can’t imagine you as a teacher,” said Malia. From anyone else, the words would’ve sounded like an insult, but from her Isaac only sensed perplexion.

“I’m not sure I can either, but I kind of like it.”

Isaac caught himself rubbing the back of his neck with his hand--a nervous tic he’d developed as a child that he couldn’t seem to get rid of. For some reason, the thought of discussing his plans to become a teacher with someone from back home made him uncomfortable. He hadn't even liked talking to Chris about it. No one who still thought of him as the traumatized, dysfunctional teenager who skipped class all the time could possibly imagine him being responsible for elementary school kids. If he voiced his plans around anyone from Beacon Hills, he’d have to face their skepticism, and that would destroy his confidence about pursuing a career he was surprisingly passionate about, in spite of his lifelong determination to never become passionate about anything.

But though Malia was from Beacon Hills, she’d never known that version of Isaac, and so she simply asked, “Did you even finish high school?” 

Isaac could almost see Malia doing the math in her head. He'd left during Junior year so they hadn't graduated together. And, if he were honest with himself, Isaac might not have bothered to finish at all if Chris hadn't made him.

“Online classes.”

“Wait.” Malia’s jaw dropped. “That was an option?”

Isaac couldn’t help but laugh at her indignation. “It’s not exactly the same, but it’s good enough. Some of my college classes are online, too. Not my lecture tomorrow morning, though.” He grimaced at the clock display on the oven.

He grabbed the remote off the couch and waved it at Malia. “You can watch TV, or eat whatever’s in the kitchen. WiFi password’s on the box.” He gestured with the remote towards the router in the corner before dropping the remote back onto the couch. He rubbed at the back of his neck again as he tried to think of anything else a good host should tell their guest (even a reluctant host).

Malia looked around the room, chewing her bottom lip, like she was suddenly surprised to find herself here. Or like she didn’t know where ‘here’ was. “Okay.”

“Okay. Well,” Isaac said awkwardly, backing towards the hall. “See you tomorrow, I guess.”

“Okay,” Malia said again, having dropped her eyes down to the still-open book lying on the table, but not looking any less lost.

Isaac retreated into his bedroom and shut the door before things could get any weirder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to another Lenna/Savannah ("Savenna") collaboration! Given that we can't seem to write a fic together (posted or not) that doesn't feature Isaac, and that we like to "solve" all love triangles with poly relationships, we present to you a fic that, as far as we can tell, is the only work on AO3 that features Isaac/Stiles/Malia ("Stisaalia," as we're calling the ship). Though Stiles won't show up right away, we promise that he's a key figure throughout, and that he'll definitely get his fair share of "screen time" by the end. Thank you for reading! It's good to be back. 
> 
> A note for the title of chapter 1, taken from https://www.fluentu.com/blog/french/common-french-sayings
> 
> Chacun voit midi à sa porte.
> 
> Literal translation: “Each person sees noon at his/her door.”
> 
> Meaning: This saying refers to the way in which each person has their own way of perceiving things and the way this perception guides how he/she interacts with others, sets goals, works and lives. In short, nobody has the same expectations and ambitions. This saying can also refer to a person’s selfishness, when the only thing that matters is his/her point of view.
> 
> Usage: This saying is commonly used as a retort to tell someone to stop making comparisons between people because everyone is different. You can also use it when you find it impossible to reason with someone because his/her self-interest reigns supreme.


	2. Rien ne sert de courir ; il faut partir à point / There’s No Point in Running; You Have to Set Out in Due Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Malia wants to actually enjoy Paris and Isaac has a rough couple of days.

MALIA

Malia’s first few days in Paris were… confusing.

There was a better word for it, she _knew_ there was a better word for it, but she just couldn’t… She didn’t mind that her sleep schedule didn’t fit the times when other people were up; she liked nighttime and the city was very pretty from the living room window with all of the buildings lit up. Well, she _usually_ liked nighttime. But here in this huge city, in this apartment that smelled ancient, with this boy she hardly knew who had so far spent most of her waking hours at work or asleep, nighttime was… _lonely_.

Malia didn’t hate loneliness, exactly. She resented it. It had taken her a while to find that word, _resented_ , as the way to describe how loneliness made her feel. She hadn’t felt lonely as a coyote. It was only after she’d been forced back into her human skin and become part of Scott’s pack that Malia had realized how nice it could be when someone wanted you to be around them… and how awful it was when you didn’t have anyone. And when you were as bad at talking to people as Malia was, it was easier to deal with being lonely than to suffer the awkwardness of trying to make new friends.

The trouble now was that Malia only knew one person in Paris, and she _had_ to be around him, but she didn’t know if Isaac _wanted_ her around, which was the confusing part. They hadn’t interacted much after that first night, but when they did see each other, he didn’t seem to mind her being there, at least not in any obvious way. Not even in the awkward-new-friend way. They were just… some other word she couldn’t think of. They were good. They worked.

Isaac cooked food for Malia whenever he made it for himself and made sure there was enough for lunch in the fridge, and he sat in the living room with her if they were awake at the same time, him doing whatever work he was doing while Malia read her guide book, not really talking but also not _not_ talking. She just liked being around him. Isaac smelled good and he had a nice voice and he didn’t judge Malia if she asked a question or tell her she was dumb or being weird.

People usually expected Malia to talk--about how she was _feeling_ , mostly--and she was sick of doing that. She’d never been able to “open up” enough to make her therapist happy anyway, and besides, what was so wrong about keeping your thoughts in your own head? That was where they came from so maybe sometimes that’s where they were supposed to stay. Isaac seemed to get that. So sometimes they talked, but mostly they didn’t, and for those brief windows, Malia didn’t feel so lonely.

He hadn’t offered her that awful wine again after the first night, but that was fine by her. Isaac could keep his rotten-tasting juice.

So yeah, Isaac was different from everyone else Malia knew, and this place was different from everywhere else she’d known, and that was interesting and exciting but still… mostly lonely. And confusing, or whatever word she really meant.

Soon she’d go outside. She’d adjust to all the strange sounds and scents and she’d have the wonderful Paris adventure she’d been longing for. Soon.

First, though, she needed to figure out how to live with Isaac. Or anyone else, for that matter. If she was planning on seeing Europe, she’d read that she’d probably have to stay in hostels in rooms with tons of other people. Thinking about _that_ nightmare, it seemed like one person should be easy. Which it was mostly, except there were a few things that Malia never seemed to be able to get right…

“Can I help you?” Isaac asked in _that_ tone. The same one Stiles always used on Malia when he was asking a question that wasn’t _really_ a question because he clearly thought she was supposed to know the answer even though she almost always didn’t.

“No,” said Malia. And if she sounded a little defensive, she blamed Isaac for sounding condescending--a word she’d learned very early on in her reintroduction to human society. She rooted through the bathroom cabinet. 

There was a sigh that might have gotten lost in the sound of running water for anyone without werewolf hearing and then, “I’m probably going to regret asking, but, what are you looking for?”

“Toothpaste.” Malia held up her prize. “I ran out.”

“So you decided to steal mine?”

“You said if I needed anything--”

“Yeah,” said Isaac, “but not while I'm _showering_.”

Because, sure, maybe Isaac _was_ showering, but it wasn’t Malia’s fault that there was no shower curtain to hold in the heat, just some weird, partial glass barrier that Isaac said was supposed to keep the water from splashing out. Which, by the way, it didn’t.

Still, she didn’t see why Isaac showering should keep her from brushing her teeth.

Except for one stupid thing:

Showering involved being naked, and humans could be really weird about nakedness. The first conversation Malia had had with Stiles had been while she was showering. He’d been weird about her being naked then, but later he’d liked when she was naked. It had taken Malia a long time to learn when and where it was okay for her, or other people, to be naked. She still hadn’t figured that out with Isaac.

The problem, again, was that Isaac was _different_ , and different meant different rules. 

In the few days that she’d known him, Isaac hadn’t cared about what she wore or when she slept or if they talked about anything at all. Malia realized that maybe she’d thought Isaac didn’t care about anything, but apparently he still had at least a few of the same hang ups as everyone else. Including about nakedness.

“Stiles didn’t tell me I couldn’t do things when he was showering,” Malia muttered under her breath.

Isaac made a strange sound, and when Malia looked at him to see if his expression made his meaning clearer, he abruptly turned away from her and snatched his towel off the rack on the wall to cover himself, despite the fact that the water was still running.

“ _Stiles_ was having sex with you,” he said finally, like that explained everything.

“So?” She cocked her head to the side, trying hard to understand why Isaac was annoyed with her. “You’re weird about being naked because you’re not having sex with me?”

Isaac hid his face in his palm, like not seeing Malia would somehow make Malia not see him. 

If Malia had to guess at Isaac’s emotion right now, she’d say he was embarrassed. It wasn’t like he had anything to be embarrassed about, though. He was tall and nice to look at and he always smelled good. She wondered if it would help to tell him that, but when she tried to tell Stiles stuff like that she’d only ever managed to embarrass him worse, so maybe she shouldn’t tell Isaac either.

Boys were so frustrating.

No, Malia corrected herself, _people_ were frustrating. Girls weren’t any better than boys, she just had more experience dealing with boy-stupidity since her only female friends--Lydia and Kira--were actually really smart. Scott’s mom was also really smart.

So maybe it _was_ a boy thing.

Stiles had been the main person who’d taught Malia how to behave around other people, after all, which made it hard to remember that some of the rules for how she could or should act with Stiles weren’t the same as for other people.

“I just want to brush my teeth,” Malia groaned. “If I have sex with you, can I brush my teeth while you shower?”

Isaac’s entire body stiffened. He didn’t look up when he said, “Out. Now.”

Frustrated but not wanting to fight, Malia took her toothbrush and Isaac’s toothpaste and went back into her room, closing the bathroom door behind her to keep the steam in for Isaac, even though she’d been enjoying its warmth and the scent of Isaac’s shampoo. There was a sink in the small bathroom near the kitchen.

* * *

ISAAC

“I don’t speak French.”

If Isaac hadn’t already been awake because of Malia’s relentless early-morning pacing in those beat-up combat boots of hers, her voice might not have woken him at first. It was… soft. In a way that was very unlike the girl he had been getting to know in pieces throughout the week. Almost… shy? Embarrassed?

Which was ironic considering that Isaac was the one lying prone in bed, half-dressed and muzzy-eyed, while Malia stood over him just inside his personal space. Not to mention the shower incident the night before.

Isaac hadn’t seen Malia since she’d taken his toothpaste. He’d gone to bed and Malia had done… whatever it was Malia spent her time doing when Isaac wasn’t around. After living in the same space for almost a week, Isaac had realized that they both kept to very different schedules. He didn’t know how much of that was jet lag and how much was just Malia, but since she was quiet (apart from the pacing) and didn’t keep Isaac up all night, he didn’t really care. 

Except when she was walking in on him in the shower or waking him up far too early on one of his few days off, anyway.

Isaac decided that, in addition to locking both his bathroom door and Malia’s while he was in there from now on, he was also going to start locking his bedroom and bathroom doors while he slept. Not that the apartment’s ancient doors would be particularly effective against someone with determination and supernatural strength, but Isaac would at least have some warning for next time if Malia had to break down a door in order to harass him.

It took several long seconds and more than a few sleepy blinks on Isaac’s part before he really registered what Malia had said.

“Makes sense,” Isaac said with a sleepy shrug, still under the blankets. “I’m actually kind of surprised you speak English this well considering how long you were a coyote.”

A comment like that might’ve offended a more sensitive person. Malia, Isaac was learning, didn’t easily take offense.

“Right?” she agreed. “I don’t speak French, and I came to France. _Alone_.”

Sensing that his input wasn’t immediately needed, Isaac pulled the covers back up to his chin. He made himself keep his eyes open, because it was polite (and because he enjoyed looking at her), but he let her keep talking.

“What was I thinking?” She was starting to look upset, eyebrows knitted together. “If I can’t talk to anyone, how am I supposed to go places and get food and--”

“Breathe,” said Isaac, reaching out to loosely grab her wrist for emphasis. This anxious version of Malia was unfamiliar. He didn’t like it. “Slow and deep.”

Malia stared down at his hand around her wrist, and for a second Isaac thought she might react violently, but then she did take a deep breath, and then another. Her arm went slack in his grip and he let it go.

“This is a big tourist city,” Isaac assured her. “Plenty of people come here who don’t speak French. One of the Parisians’ favorite things to do is be annoyed with tourists who don’t speak French.”

Her teeth were worrying into her bottom lip, but she regarded him with slightly less anxiety in her eyes. “Really?”

Isaac made an affirmative sound. “But if you’re still worried about getting lost, I’ll show you around. If you want.”

Her visible relief, which warred with a hint of wariness, made the corner of Isaac’s mouth tug up.

Isaac had caught himself almost-smiling like that a few times since Malia had arrived. Having her in his--Chris’s-- _the_ \--apartment was strange, but not as unpleasant as he would’ve thought having an unexpected roommate might be. Except for the shower thing, Malia was mostly considerate of Isaac and thanked him when he did something for her (like cooking or showing her how to do laundry). But she also didn’t defer to him if she wanted something. Like, if she wanted cereal and Isaac was in the kitchen, she would grab the box from the pantry, even if it meant casually shouldering Isaac out of the way while he was getting a mug for his coffee. That would’ve been annoying from a lot of people, but he didn’t seem to mind it from her. Maybe the difference was that if it had been someone else, it would’ve been rude or inconsiderate. Malia’s inconsiderate behavior seemed to stem from the fact that she’d had so many things to consider lately and manners weren’t her top priority.

One of the more problematic areas in which Malia didn’t _consider_ was her wardrobe. She paid very little attention to what she wore, which wouldn’t have been a problem for Isaac except “what she wore” usually amounted to “very little.” Bras were a rarity, and while Isaac hadn’t been celibate during his time in Paris, he didn’t have as many sexual encounters as a teenager in a city full of beautiful people might like to have, and looks-wise, Malia could give a fair few of those people a run for their money. Long-legged, slightly muscled but also soft in the right places, Malia with her big eyes and wavy hair was attractive almost in spite of herself.

And this girl had been dating _Stiles_? At first, Isaac couldn’t understand it at all. It wasn’t that Stiles himself wasn’t attractive enough to be with someone like Malia. (God knew Isaac’s opinion on Stiles’s looks, though he’d never told anyone.) It was just that the only person Isaac had ever known Stiles to be interested in was Lydia, and Malia and Lydia were worlds apart in terms of personality and background. But then Isaac thought about the fact that Stiles and Malia had been locked up in Eichen House together, and how much Stiles had been through in the months before Isaac had left. Maybe post-Nogitsune Stiles needed someone different than the kind of person pre-Nogitsune Stiles had wanted.

“Can we go now?” Excitement sparkled in Malia’s eyes, and Isaac’s smile threatened to show.

“Clothes first,” said Isaac, because he wasn’t about to get caught naked in the same room as Malia again right now. “Then coffee.”

“Okay,” Malia agreed quickly, but she made no move to leave.

Isaac sighed deeply. “Clothes first, _alone_ ,” he clarified.

She blinked at him, genuinely confused. This appeared to be one of those scenarios where Isaac was going to have to play Miss Manners.

“I’m not getting out of this bed,” he said patiently, “until you're in another room and the door is the way it was when you found it. Closed.”

Malia gave him a _look_ that conveyed ‘Seriously? You think I care if you’re naked?’ without the aid of words, but Isaac didn’t move, and finally she relented and left the way she’d arrived: through the bathroom. Isaac suspected that she was worried he’d change his mind if she argued.

* * *

MALIA

Malia didn’t care about a lot of things. She didn’t care about nakedness or having hair on her legs or if people smelled like people instead of flowers and fruits.

But those were things that _other_ people cared about and, like Stiles and her therapist had always tried to tell her, Malia needed to be considerate of other people’s feelings. And since Isaac seemed to care about at least some of those things, Malia was trying really hard to care, too. Even though it was stupid and didn’t matter because it wasn’t like animals wore clothes but whatever.

So she left Isaac to get dressed _alone, with the door shut_ and went to the kitchen to make Isaac coffee since his stupid press thing that he’d shown her how to use took so much longer than a normal coffee pot. Although, she did have to admit, it did make good coffee.

Malia had been so excited to leave Beacon Hills and start this adventure. She’d been excited as she’d left for the airport, even with her dad insisting on dropping her off. She’d been so excited on the plane that she hadn’t been able to sleep at all. She’d been excited right up until she had stepped off the plane and waited in line at Customs listening to all sorts of languages being spoken around her--none of them languages that she’d been able to understand--and realized that she’d done exactly what she’d set out to do and now had no idea what to do next.

Getting from the airport to the apartment had been easy. Just a matter of giving an address to the man driving the taxi and giving him money. She’d done that before. But then she hadn’t left the apartment again. Despite all the pages marked in her book and all the things she was desperate to see, that excitement just hadn’t been there anymore, leaving Malia tired and annoyed and more than willing to simply stay inside.

By the time Isaac _finally_ came out of his room, Malia had poured Isaac’s coffee into the thermos mug thing he took to work with him and was waiting by the door with it. Isaac just smirked when he saw her and shook his head. He didn’t say a word as he walked past her; he simply took the thermos out of her hands and opened the door, holding it for her as he took a drink.

And suddenly, as though that closed door was all that had stood between her and her adventure, Malia was excited again. She was finally going to explore Paris. 

She grinned at Isaac and led the way out of the building.

* * *

ISAAC

Watching Malia explore Paris made Isaac realize how much of the city he’d been missing out on. Chris’s apartment building wasn’t located in one of the arrondissements so Isaac rarely made it all the way into the city center. He crossed the Seine every day on his way to school, but there was definitely something to be said about walking the banks. 

The area was definitely touristy, there was no escaping that in a big city. Large groups of foreign middle-school students with matching hats for visibility followed exhausted-looking parents and teachers through the square in front of Notre Dame while panhandlers attempted to con English speakers into “helping” them through a fictional crisis. But even though the paintings being created for sale along the Champs-Élysées were somewhat generic, they were still beautiful, as were the trees and the architecture. In shop windows there were clothes so expensive Isaac could work for a year and not be able to afford anything in the store, but there were also little cakes and pastries so perfectly formed they looked like they were made of clay or plastic. Isaac had the fleeting thought that there was probably no better place in the world for window shopping.

When he caught a whiff of a scent that caused his wolf to prick up its metaphorical ears in warning, Isaac was reminded that it hadn’t simply been that he was too busy to take the time to explore Paris--there was also the added risk of running into other werewolves while wandering. Other werewolves who might feel territorial of their city’s cultural heart and not want tourists and omegas getting too comfortable.

Chris had cautioned Isaac early on to always be aware while walking around the city, that most werewolf packs disliked omegas on principle. 

“Packs here will only pay attention to an omega for two reasons,” Chris had warned him. “Either they’re looking to strengthen their pack or they want to make sure nobody else’s pack gets stronger.”

Chris had gone on to talk about how when there are too many packs in too small of a space, omegas unlucky enough to get involved often find themselves pressured to join a pack or run out of town. And since foreigner werewolves were either already betas in foreign packs, or omegas who wouldn’t be staying in Paris permanently, they were almost universally disliked.

“So why stay then?” Isaac had asked. “There must be other places in France they could go.”

“There are. But French packs are some of the oldest in the world. Very territorial. They’re never going to abandon land that has belonged to them since the first werewolf in their line claimed it however many hundred years ago.”

Isaac had assured Chris that he didn’t care about pack politics. He would leave long before he’d let someone pressure him into joining another pack. Chris had just patted Isaac on the shoulder and continued to train him in proper crossbow usage.

Now, escorting Malia around the city, Isaac was particularly aware of their surroundings. Though the scent he’d first caught had dissipated without sign of a werewolf nearby, he cautioned himself to stay alert. He definitely didn’t want to alarm Malia unnecessarily or ruin her first time exploring Paris, but he also didn’t want them to be caught unawares. So if he paid more attention to the people around them than the sights, well, Isaac figured Malia would see enough of Paris for the both of them.

Except that, for all of his intentions to keep an eye out for other werewolves, Isaac kept finding himself getting distracted.

Specifically, Isaac found himself watching the way Malia interacted with the world around her. She was so… open. So uninhibited. If she wanted to see something closer, she didn’t second guess herself, she just grabbed Isaac’s sleeve and tugged him along with her. Isaac could pretty much count on his fingers the number of times that he’d been confident enough to just do what he wanted and go where he pleased without asking the people around him first--and most of those times had been just after becoming a werewolf. But Malia seemed to follow every impulse that jumped into her head. It was only after the fact that she would check with Isaac to make sure he had also wanted to watch the boats pass under the bridge they were on, or read the plaque on the statue across the road. When she had decided she was in the mood for ice cream, she’d nearly pulled Isaac off his feet in her haste to see what flavors the street vendor had.

After Isaac translated the names of the flavors and the vendor’s recommendations to Malia, she’d ended up buying four different elaborate ice creams to share with Isaac. He suspected she would have bought more but they only had four hands between them.

“Oh,” Malia said after tasting the two she was holding. One was several shades of pink and sprinkled with pieces of dried fruit, the other was something drenched in caramel and butterscotch. He couldn’t see what color the ice cream was underneath. The vendor’s scoops were so large, both ice creams appeared equally at risk of escaping their cones and running down the sides before Malia would have time to finish either one. Isaac’s were similarly piled onto the comparatively small cones, but both of the ice creams she had given him to hold were some variation of chocolate with more chocolate on top.

“What?” Isaac asked, worried she was unhappy with the ones she’d chosen. He shouldn’t have worried.

“I want to try the others.” Malia looked between all four cones, trying to figure out the best way to trade the ice cream between them. After a moment, she shook her head. “Here, hold out your hand.”

Isaac did.

Rationally, Isaac wasn’t surprised by the way Malia’s tongue darted out and took a broad lick of the ice cream in his hand, but he also hadn’t been ready for it. He swallowed hard as she leaned in to taste the second ice cream.

“You should help me eat these,” Malia said between licks. “This one’s already dripping.”

Isaac kept his eyes averted from the way she licked up the side of the dripping cone in his hand. Not watching her meant that he jerked in surprise, almost dropping the cone, when he felt her lips fasten to the side of his hand, sucking the melted ice cream off his skin.

The words “oh, fuck” fell from Isaac’s lips in a whispered gasp before he could stop them, the contact of Malia’s mouth on his knuckles sending a jolt of sensation through him. Heat flooded his cheeks as his heart pounded and his body savagely reminded him how long it had been since someone’s lips had touched his skin.

And then his brain, struggling to keep hold of his actions, sternly cautioned that Malia wasn’t trying to be sexy. She’d probably just forgotten what she’d been taught about personal boundaries in her excitement over the ice cream. But the look of ecstasy on her face and the pleased sound she made in her throat at the taste of the ice cream were _not_ helping Isaac’s efforts to be good.

Thankfully, the noise of the streets around them seemed to have covered Isaac’s whisper and his thudding pulse, because Malia didn’t comment on either of them. She just smiled that smile Isaac was beginning to find so charming, and declared that the ice cream in the hand she’d licked was the best flavor.

It was almost enough to make him forget about the threat of other wolves. Almost.

* * *

MALIA

They were being watched.

Malia first noticed it near Notre Dame, the prickly sensation of eyes on her. She was pretty sure Isaac had noticed it even before she did, which would explain why he’d been on edge basically the whole time they’d been out. She just hadn’t known why. Maybe he didn’t like being out in the open, which was smart because in the open there were hunters and other predators, but most people didn’t understand that.

And here Isaac was, watching her back without a second thought.

Maybe Isaac was like her: more wolf than human, just like Malia was more coyote.

That actually made Malia feel more comfortable with him. Not that she had been uncomfortable before, but the more wolfish Isaac acted, the less uncomfortably different Malia felt. She knew she wasn’t very good at being a person sometimes. 

Most times.

She’d been a coyote for so long, she didn’t think that being human was ever going to feel normal. But at least Isaac seemed to understand that and didn’t make her feel bad about it.

Malia glanced around, not bothering to be subtle, to see if she could catch whoever was watching them. Nobody seemed to be paying them any particular attention, but there were so many people around and plenty of side streets and cars and building windows, it would’ve been almost impossible to tell if they were.

“Deciding where you want to go next?” Isaac asked, and his voice was calm even though he was still on alert.

Malia shrugged, figuring if Isaac didn’t want to talk about it, whoever was watching them must be a werewolf and would be able to hear them. She took a few deep breaths through her nose, trying to catch a scent, but once again there were just too many people around.

She brushed it off. If Isaac wasn’t too worried, Malia wouldn’t be either. She trusted that he’d tell her if she needed to know. and that was that.

Malia grabbed a fistful of Isaac’s coat and tugged him towards the cathedral.

* * *

ISAAC

After a weekend spent doing all the tourist stuff that Isaac hadn’t taken the time to do since moving to Paris, going back to _le primaire_ , the school where he worked in the afternoons some days, was weird. Not exactly bad, but it definitely reminded Isaac that he was living and working and attending university in a foreign country, and that wasn’t exactly something everyone just did. 

Even just walking into the classroom, Isaac felt like he had when he’d first started, like he was just pretending he was qualified to be there. At least, being an assistant (and an American at that), almost nobody usually expected him to do anything important anyway, so he spent a lot of time straightening up the classroom and organizing the supply closet. Plus, the kids in the after-school program he helped in were, like, nine years old and still thought everyone over the age of eighteen was an adult that knew what they were doing.

Which was good because Isaac Did Not know what he was doing. Not in Paris. Not with Malia. None of it.

Isaac especially didn’t know what to do when he realized something that he had probably known for a while, but hadn’t wanted to confront.

There was this one kid in the back of Mme Benoite’s class, maybe a little younger than the rest, definitely quieter, but somehow from day one, Isaac had always noticed him. Luka. It hadn't been until today that Isaac had fully realized why. 

Isaac should have recognized the signs: the evasive behavior, the dark circles under his eyes, the fear every time he was called on or mentioned. But today the fingers on the kid’s right hand had been wrapped in so many bandages that he'd looked like a mummy. They were poorly applied and spotted with blood (although Isaac probably wouldn’t have been able to tell except that werewolf noses were particularly good at smelling blood), like the kid had wrapped them himself. 

After the rest of the class had been dismissed, Isaac noticed that Luka wasn’t packing up as quickly as everyone else. It could have been because of his hand, but Isaac suspected it had more to do with Luka’s reluctance to see whoever it was that would be picking him up from school. With Mme Benoite having already left for a meeting, trusting Isaac to lock up once the kids were gone, it was as good an opportunity as Isaac was likely to get to find out. 

“How’s your hand?” Isaac asked in English, pointing to his own right hand. He was supposed to always speak English to the kids and decline to speak with them in French if he could avoid it.

Luka’s shoulders shot up in an awkward shrug that felt rehearsed before replying in French: “Car door.” He mimed the closing motion and then added in English, “Clumsy.”

Isaac didn’t let his skepticism show on his face, even though he’d never known Luka to be clumsy in class. He also didn’t miss the way that Luka hadn’t actually answered his question.

“Do you want to go to the nurse?” he asked, again in English.

If the way Luka had responded before felt rehearsed, Luka’s reaction to Isaac’s second question felt all too real. Luka's eyes grew wide and terrified and he hid his injured hand behind his back, like he was scared that Isaac was going to grab it and examine Luka’s fingers. That was the moment that Isaac had known for sure. 

Isaac knew that Luka wouldn't go to the nurse for the same reason that Isaac himself had never gone. No matter how bad the bruise or cut, Isaac had never let anyone close enough to see what had happened, making up whatever excuse made the most sense to keep people from wondering why he had so many injuries.

Seeing Luka’s fear sent a hurricane of emotion through Isaac: anger, embarrassment, guilt, aching depression… emotions that Isaac thought he'd long put behind him.

He swallowed down the sour taste those emotions left in his mouth and let Luka leave without pressing the issue. 

Isaac had _wanted_ to talk to Luka about it, to tell him that it wasn’t worth protecting his abusers, but Isaac knew it wouldn't help. Isaac knew first-hand how impossible it had felt to even think about saying something to anyone about what his dad was doing. If it hadn’t been for Derek and the kanima--even now he couldn’t think of it as Jackson--Isaac wondered how long it would’ve taken him to get out of that situation. If he _ever_ would’ve gotten out. Isaac liked thinking that he would’ve stopped his dad, eventually. That he would’ve said something, or reported him. He still felt embarrassed that Derek had found out. That Jackson had at least suspected. It had been Isaac’s problem. Isaac should’ve been the one to stop it.

From the way that Luka practically fled the classroom, Isaac wondered if Luka felt the same way that Isaac had. Maybe the kid realized that Isaac knew, or at least suspected, and was ashamed that he’d let someone find out too much. Maybe not. Either way, Isaac was left in the empty classroom feeling like he was sixteen again, failing Chemistry and terrified of leaving the dubious safety that school had provided.

Because as hard as this was for Isaac to confront, it wasn't about him anymore. It was about this kid. Isaac had to help him, there was no question. But shouldn't Isaac have more than a suspicion before he took this to an authority? Especially if Luka was going to deny it. He had no idea how child abuse reporting laws worked in France, and he was terrified that if someone confronted Luka’s family prematurely, things would end up worse for him. Which meant that, regardless of who he told, Isaac might be left waiting for proof that he hoped he’d never get while a kid suffered. Just like he had.

Isaac had never felt more useless.

* * *

MALIA

Something must’ve really been wrong. Malia had tried to be patient. Sometimes people had bad days and didn’t want to talk about them. Sometimes they were _moody_. It wasn’t that weird for her and Isaac not to talk for a while. At least, she didn’t think it was, but since they’d only spent a week together, Malia couldn’t really be sure what was or wasn’t weird. At the very least, he’d never come home and immediately gone to his room without saying anything at all to her. 

He was in there long enough that Malia almost went to check on him, but she could hear him pacing back and forth in there, so she figured he was okay. He’d work whatever _this_ was out and then he’d come out and make dinner or maybe they could go somewhere and everything would be like it was before.

But he didn’t come out. Instead, Isaac went straight into the bathroom and immediately turned on the shower. This annoyed Malia for a moment: They were supposed to ask each other if they needed something from the bathroom before they took a shower or a bath, since they shared it. But then it occurred to Malia that even when Isaac was annoyed with her, he was never _inconsiderate_. She nearly knocked on the door to ask him if he was okay, but after the incident where she had tried to brush her teeth when he was showering, she was wary. After Isaac had taken the time to help her explore the city and watch their backs so she could enjoy it, she didn’t want to make him feel awkward or invade his space.

Maybe she could talk to him when he was done with his shower. You were supposed to offer to talk to people when they were upset. And maybe the shower would make Isaac feel a little better. After all, sometimes showering cheered Malia up. The water was warm enough to almost make her feel like she had fur again, and it drowned out how _noisy_ the human world was compared with the woods. It was comforting. Maybe Isaac found it comforting, too.

She could wait for him. She _should_ wait for him. She shouldn’t let someone be alone when they were sad. What could she say to Isaac, though? ‘Hey, you’re in a crappy mood’? Malia had been learning how to talk to Stiles, and Scott, and Lydia. To be a good friend. But she didn’t know Isaac. He was like… like an Unknown in math. A variable. Like ‘solving for X.’ Malia was terrible at math, and she wasn’t much better with people. There probably wasn’t anything she could do to help Isaac.

He was still in the shower when Malia crawled into bed after eating some leftovers because it didn’t seem likely that Isaac would make dinner tonight. She dozed for a bit, but staying asleep was impossible. She kept imagining things that might upset someone like Isaac this badly, and they got worse by the minute. She didn’t even realize she was shifting into her coyote form until her thoughts started to calm, transformed into animal instincts.

The water had stopped running at some point while she’d been drifting in and out of sleep. Isaac was in his room. The apartment was quiet and smelled like… anxiety. And sadness. She could _feel_ him in the next room. She wanted him not to be sad. She wanted him not to be alone. She wouldn’t let him be alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! We're becoming more and more obsessed with this/these ship(s) as we write.
> 
> A note for the title of chapter 2, taken from https://www.fluentu.com/blog/french/common-french-sayings
> 
> Meaning: This one is from the first lines of “Le lièvre et la tortue” (“The Tortoise and the Hare”) by Jean de la Fontaine, and it’s the French version of “Slow and steady wins the race.” There’s no point in starting something with gusto only to putter out in the end. Easy does it!
> 
> Usage: This saying extols the virtue of patience. Incidentally, this is a good one for French learners of all levels to keep in mind during the adventure that is learning French.


	3. Il vaut mieux prévenir que guérir / It is Better to Prevent Than to Heal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Isaac extends an invitation and Malia does some rearranging.

ISAAC

The creaking of his bathroom door startled Isaac awake. His sleep-fogged brain belatedly realized that, in his distracted state, he’d forgotten his resolution to lock the door when he went to bed. A few seconds later, a weight made the side of his bed sag, and the scent of clean dog fur wafted toward him. Not dog, he corrected himself mentally. _Coyote_.

The coyote--Malia--nuzzled her snout against Isaac’s shoulder, and his hand automatically came up to run his palm over the top of her head. Isaac had always wanted a dog, and envied other kids who’d had them growing up. But even before his mom and Cam had died, his dad hadn’t trusted Isaac to handle the responsibility. Hell, his dad had barely trusted Isaac to maintain the chemical balance of their swimming pool.

Malia leaned her head against Isaac’s hand, then unceremoniously flopped down against his side. Once she got comfortable she heaved a contented sigh. Isaac wasn’t really sure what to do. Why was she there? Had she known he was upset? Was this just something she did sometimes, shift into a coyote and snuggle with the nearest person?

Still, the warmth and softness of the coyote against him was kind of nice. No, that wasn’t the word for it. There wasn’t really a word for how it made Isaac feel. It made the ache in his chest--the knot of stress and remembered fear--tighten. It seemed to move up through his neck, then burst free all of a sudden in a bone-wracking sob. Tears quickly welled in his eyes and spilled down across his cheeks. Isaac curled in on himself on instinct, but the coyote was there beside him, preventing him from closing up completely. So he hid his face in her fur and cried. Hard, ugly, childish sobs.

If she’d been human, Isaac would’ve been mortified. But the coyote wasn’t judging him. She only interjected a worried whine or a soothing sound now and then. When he finally pulled back a bit so he could catch his breath, she even licked away some of his tears. It was… He still couldn’t find the right words, but it was exactly what he’d needed. The knot in his chest had eased. His muscles weren’t tense anymore. He felt drained, but in a good way. Calm. 

Finally, Isaac’s eyelids grew heavy. He fell asleep with his fingers still laced through the fur at the back of the coyote’s neck.

Waking up was another matter entirely. Isaac found himself lying on his side in bed, like he usually did, but there was a warm body pressed up against his back. It took a few seconds for him to remember that coyote-Malia had infiltrated his bed last night. But the scent of coyote fur had been replaced by something much more appealing. The arm draped protectively across his waist was decidedly human. And the warmth that was pressed up against his bare back was _… skin_.

Isaac’s face suddenly grew very hot. His muscles tensed and his pulse sped up. Malia had shifted back to human during the night, which meant there was a naked girl _spooning_ him, and all he was wearing was a pair of boxers. He was skin-to-skin with a _naked girl_.

Malia emitted a sleepy sigh through her nose that tickled the back of Isaac’s neck and made a shiver run through his skin. She shifted her body against his, and the arm around his waist pulled him closer. Well, this just wasn’t _fair_. 

It took Isaac three tries and two small throat-clearing coughs to whisper the word into the half-light of dawn:

“Malia?”

After a pause, she made a small sound of acknowledgment.

“You okay?” Isaac wasn’t sure why he was whispering. They were both awake, after all. But somehow it felt like talking at normal volume would break whatever sleepy, surreal spell they were both under at the moment. 

Malia snorted, and Isaac could practically feel her roll her eyes.

“Are _you_?” she countered, and tapped the skin over his heart for emphasis. She could hear how fast it was beating, of course. Here, in the quiet of his bedroom, he didn’t have the benefit of a bustling city to mask his body’s responses to her. Malia’s hand on his chest sent another involuntary shiver through Isaac.

“Yeah,” Isaac half-lied. On the one hand, there was an attractive naked person in bed with him. Isaac really liked being in bed with attractive naked people when given the opportunity. On the other hand, this attractive naked person was only there and only naked because she had fallen asleep next to Isaac while in the form of a coyote. Isaac had no idea what Malia wanted from him, and was genuinely afraid that he’d do the wrong thing, and then living with her would be excruciatingly awkward.

“Tell me why you’re nervous.” Malia’s voice was still quiet, but she was a lot more awake now. “I don’t know what to do when people don’t say what they’re thinking.”

* * *

MALIA

Malia hated this feeling: like there was something she was supposed to understand about a situation but she just didn’t _get it_. And she was tired and warm and just wanted to go back to sleep. But Isaac’s heart was racing. He seemed nervous. Why? Was he uncomfortable? Was Malia being rude? Isaac smelled like maybe he was interested in sex, but Stiles had told her once that sometimes people, especially boys, just woke up that way. 

It was so frustrating! Malia had crawled into bed with Isaac because she didn’t know how else to make him feel better. Had he not wanted her to? Sure, she’d ended up making him _cry_ , but then he’d calmed down and fallen asleep. At the time, she’d thought it had helped him. Had she misunderstood?

“Nothing’s wrong,” Isaac finally said. “I just didn’t expect this.”

“Expect what?”

“You. Here.”

“You were awake when I came in here.”

“Yeah, but not human. Not… naked.”

 _Oh_. Malia frowned. She’d forgotten. _Again_. Even after the whole shower situation, she hadn’t remembered that nakedness embarrassed Isaac. But it wasn’t like she’d _tried_ to fall asleep naked with Isaac. Coyotes didn’t wear clothes! And it wasn’t like he could see her when she was behind him anyway. But clearly it still bothered him.

“Sorry,” Malia said quickly. She had gotten used to saying “Sorry” to people a lot, even when she wasn’t sure how she had offended them or what she’d done wrong. It was easier than dealing with the situation. But she really was sorry this time. Isaac was… Isaac was her friend. She didn’t want him to feel uncomfortable.

She withdrew her arm from Isaac’s waist, even though it felt so nice to be close to him. She should go back to her own bed. Hopefully that would fix this.

But Isaac turned toward her, like there was an invisible string between her hand and his body, so that once her arm was resting at her own side, he was facing toward her.

“Don’t be sorry,” said Isaac. His pulse was still quick, but it was steady. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

That was a relief to hear, but Malia still felt the urge to explain. “I used to fall asleep like that and wake up like this with Stiles. I forgot it’s different with other people.”

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac’s mouth went dry. He’d almost reined in his hormonal response to having a very attractive, very naked girl pressed up against him, and then she’d had to mention Stiles. The smart-mouthed jackass who Isaac couldn’t stand most of the time, but who had also featured in a significant percentage of Isaac’s sexual fantasies basically since Isaac had started having those kinds of fantasies at all. Malia had just unwittingly delivered the ultimate mental image: Stiles and Malia waking up naked together in Stiles’s bed. Isaac couldn’t’ve dreamed up a sexier fantasy if he’d tried.

An unbidden image flashed through Isaac’s head: Malia licking melted ice cream off of Stiles’s long, fidgety fingers.

“Doesn’t have to be different with me.” The veiled invitation escaped Isaac before he’d fully thought it through. It would’ve sounded presumptuous to most people, and Isaac’s mind scrabbled for a way to defuse the situation if Malia took offense, but she actually seemed to cheer up a bit.

“Really?”

She was smiling now, and it was infectious. Isaac felt the corner of his own mouth quirk up in response. 

“Just because I didn’t expect it doesn’t mean I don’t like it,” he said in what he hoped was a casual tone.

“Okay,” said Malia. Isaac hadn’t realized that her muscles had tensed up until she relaxed them. “Can I sleep here again, then?”

Isaac’s brain stuttered for a second at the thought of waking up with Malia naked in his bed every morning.

When he didn’t answer, Malia rushed on, “I never used to be lonely or cold before. Now it’s like that all the time. You’re warm and you smell good. But if it’s weird, I--”

“Yes,” Isaac cut her off. So few things undermined Malia’s composure that it was almost a compliment to be someone whose feelings she actually thought that much about. 

She frowned. “Yes, it’s weird?”

“Yes, you can sleep here.”

Her face lit up with this relieved smile that made Isaac’s chest feel warm and full even as butterflies sprang to life in his stomach. Maybe next time he’d wear more than just boxers while he slept…

The sharp trill of his alarm was an almost welcome distraction from, well, the distraction that was Malia, and Isaac quickly rolled over to turn it off. With his back turned, Isaac thought about just how easy it would be to fall back against his pillow and burrow down into the warm tangle of blankets and Malia. It would be so easy to stay in bed just a few more minutes.

But Isaac had a feeling that a few minutes with Malia could turn into all day. And he had spent enough time thinking the night before to know that he had to do something about Luka sooner rather than later. Even a day could make a world of difference for a kid in that situation.

Still, his urge to stay in bed with Malia was almost alarmingly strong. Even setting aside sexual attraction, Isaac found himself far more comfortable with Malia than he’d expect with someone he’d only known for a short while. Something about her allowed him to let his guard down. Maybe not all the way (people who’d grown up like Isaac had didn’t easily let themselves be unguarded), but more than maybe he should. After all, he’d just agreed to let her sleep in his bed with him again without giving any real thought to the invitation. He’d essentially said that Malia could join him every night if that’s what she wanted. And Isaac knew himself well enough to know that he’d never turn her away, because he couldn’t imagine _not_ wanting to sleep with her.

Which was to say that Isaac would be happy with any amount of sleeping together or _sleeping together_ that Malia wanted. And _that_ was not a road he could go down when he had a psychology lecture in two hours. So he’d force himself to do the responsible thing and leave the sexy, naked girl who smelled amazing and made him feel at ease for the day.

“I need to shower and get ready for class. Do you need the bathroom?” Isaac turned to ask Malia, but she looked to be already half-asleep again.

“Hmm?” Malia’s eyelids fluttered but didn’t open.

Isaac leaned over and gently traced his fingers across her hairline, tucking a few stray strands of hair behind her ear. Malia snuggled deeper into the blanket she had clutched up to her chin and sighed contentedly, which made Isaac smile as the butterflies came back in full force.

He carefully climbed out of bed--before he could do something stupid like kiss Malia’s forehead--and started getting ready for school.

* * *

MALIA

After Isaac had gotten up, Malia had dozed in bed for a while, savoring the lingering warmth Isaac had left behind and the faint sensation of his fingers trailing over her skin. 

It made her feel safe and… content? Yes, that was the word she wanted. Safe and content in a way that she hadn’t felt in a long time. Probably since she’d stopped sleeping with Stiles, if she were honest with herself. And if she were _really_ honest with herself, she had to admit that it wasn’t just that she was usually cold and sometimes lonely so it was nice to be close to someone while sleeping. It was about the _emotional_ closeness.

That was something else Malia had learned from her therapist: Malia didn’t let anyone get close to her. The coyote side of herself (though her therapist didn’t know about that whole situation) didn’t trust anyone not to try to trap or injure it, and the human side didn’t like how people tried to control how she lived her life, or judged her for not knowing what to do or say. Malia had “jagged edges,” her therapist said, that she wasn’t letting heal on purpose because they kept people away. She said Malia needed to learn to open up and trust people and be honest.

But what her therapist didn’t understand (apart from the coyote thing) was that it wasn’t like Malia _wanted_ to lie. She just knew that most people couldn’t know what she’d gone through, and even the people who did know didn’t understand.

Which she knew because when she _did_ trust people, they betrayed her. So really, her therapist should have been talking to _Stiles_ about trust issues or whatever. Malia didn’t just have “jagged edges”; she had sharp teeth, and she’d use them if she had to. Malia didn’t need people making her decisions for her. Not her dad, not an alpha, and not Stiles.

And ever since she’d come to Paris, nobody had.

Chris had offered her a place to stay, but it had been her decision to go. And since the minute Malia had arrived, Isaac had trusted that she knew what she was doing and hadn’t tried to give her advice except when she’d asked.

 _Doesn’t have to be different with me_ , Isaac had said. She could still hear the tone of his voice in her head. But it was always going to be different with Isaac, because _he_ was different. Isaac treated Malia like an adult--like an equal--and that was already enough to make him different from anyone else. 

But seeing him so sad last night, watching him hurting like that, had been so _familiar_ that Malia had realized somewhere deep inside of her that Isaac being different than everyone else meant that he was more like her.

He had jagged edges, too. A therapist would probably say the same stupid stuff about him that they said about Malia. He wasn’t telling her what to do because he wouldn’t want people to do that to him. He didn’t have parents or an alpha. He had teeth.

Falling asleep curled up with Isaac made Malia think that maybe their jagged edges weren’t there to keep them away from other people so much as to let them fit closer together with the right people. Maybe that was the reason Malia felt so comfortable with him even though other people would say they barely knew each other. Maybe there was a kind of “knowing” that just happened and it was okay if other people didn’t get it.

After Isaac had left for school, Malia had thought about sleeping more, but for the first time since arriving in Paris, she actually felt completely awake. Not to mention the fact that the window in Isaac’s room had terrible curtains that failed to keep any light out--which, in Malia's opinion, was literally the only purpose of curtains.

The curtains in her room weren’t much better, but at least there wasn’t another building’s windows reflecting the glaring morning sunlight directly into her eyes when she was lying in bed. How did Isaac stand waking up to that every single morning? 

No way was Malia going to put up with it.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac felt like a physical weight had been lifted off his shoulders. 

Maybe because he’d never been so scared about the weight of responsibility before. It wasn’t like anyone had ever trusted him with anything that mattered. Especially not, say, with the future of a child who needed help to avoid going down the same rocky road that Isaac’s own abusive childhood had sent him on.

Not that Isaac expected Luka to ever become a werewolf, but there were Dereks everywhere--people who would take advantage of a damaged kid just because they could--and Isaac would do anything he could to prevent that.

As it turned out, though, Isaac hadn’t been alone in noticing Luka’s injury or his evasive behavior over the last several weeks.

Even with the conversation he’d had with Malia that morning, Isaac had still managed to leave the apartment early enough to make it to _le primaire_ in time to catch Mme Benoite before her first class started that day. Before he’d had more than a chance to voice his suspicions, Mme Benoite was confirming them and promising that she’d already discussed a course of action with the principal. That was the meeting she’d rushed off to the day before, Isaac assumed. The teacher had thanked Isaac for his careful attention to the students and told him that she thought he would make a wonderful teacher once he was finished with school himself. 

With his fears about what might happen to Luka relieved, Isaac had headed off to his own class, but he’d still been too distracted to properly pay attention. Even on his way home, Isaac had almost been hit by a car because he couldn’t stop thinking about Luka’s situation and his own.

Because Isaac couldn’t help wonder if they were really going to help Luka by getting involved. If the situation was bad enough, Luka might end up in the foster care system, something Isaac had always dreaded happening to him as a kid. It was why he’d lied to the sheriff about his black eye and made countless excuses for other injuries over the years.

It had only been his werewolf reflexes that had allowed Isaac to swerve his bike out of the way of the car in time to only receive a blistering string of French insults rather than an injury that might have created a situation too complicated to explain.

Isaac had decided to walk his bike the rest of the way home after that, pausing at a park bench down the block in order to collect his thoughts before going inside. This wasn’t really something he felt like he could discuss with Malia, after all. She didn’t really know about his past and he didn’t really want her to.

Their situation was already complicated enough without adding new elements to their already unusual friendship. 

So Isaac thought about all the ways that he and Luka might be similar, and how they might be different, and if some of what Isaac felt might be jealousy that Luka had people looking out for him when Isaac hadn’t, and how stupid it was to be jealous of a kid who needed help and got it.

Isaac also thought about what it meant that he’d actually gone to an adult for help with a situation he didn’t know how to handle, and how that showed incredible personal growth. He considered the idea that he might be too used to handling everything himself. He’d been prepared to handle Luka’s situation himself if nobody else had believed him (which was a dangerous thought that Isaac didn’t want to consider too closely). He was glad it hadn’t come to that.

But there was no point dwelling on that. Isaac really wanted to think that they’d helped Luka the right way, so he clung to his feelings of relief from earlier, grabbed his bike, and headed back to the apartment.

Where his relief was quickly overtaken by confusion, owing to the fact that his bedroom looked like it had been ransacked.

“Malia?” Isaac called. The apartment didn’t smell like anyone else had been there and he hadn’t noticed anything out of place in the kitchen or living room where actual expensive things like Chris’s whiskey and TV and stuff were, so he didn’t _think_ they’d been robbed… Still, the fact that Malia hadn’t so much as greeted him when he got home had Isaac just a little worried.

He knocked tentatively on her bedroom door before easing it open. As soon as he peeked inside, Isaac discovered what had happened.

Malia had apparently moved all his stuff into her/Chris’s room. His clothes were stuffed haphazardly into the small dresser, and when they clearly hadn’t fit, Malia had given up and left the drawers open. The wardrobe was similarly packed, with the arms and legs of his work clothes--that he needed to keep hung up so that they wouldn’t wrinkle--sticking out in all directions. Malia had even apparently tried to make space for his clothes by dumping some of her things back into her backpack, which sat on the floor at the foot of her bed. The only things she apparently hadn’t tried to move were the things on his desk, and those had probably only been left because Chris’s room lacked the space for them. Most of Chris’s room was dominated by the large, cozy bed. During the brief time that Chris had lived in the apartment with Isaac, he’d done most of his work at the kitchen island and had let Isaac keep the desk for his schoolwork. 

That had been Chris’s one rule for Isaac coming with him to France: Isaac couldn’t fall behind in school. Which had meant homeschooling over the Internet and an insane amount of exams and college prep, but it had paid off. Even without Chris there looking over his shoulder, Isaac had actually graduated almost seven months early. Early enough to enroll in a program for teaching English as a foreign language in winter. By the time he had started college in the fall, he’d already been a student teacher for the whole summer and was more confident than he had expected in his choice to major in education.

Having solved the mystery of his missing stuff, Isaac figured he should probably try to find Malia, too. After all, if Malia was moving his stuff into her room, they might have a few things to talk about.

“Malia?” he called out again.

This time, he heard a faint murmur of recognition coming from the shared bathroom. Isaac inched carefully to the mostly open door from Malia’s room and peeked cautiously inside. Just because Malia had no problem with being all naked and sexy all over the place didn’t mean that Isaac had any intention of spying on her.

Isaac angled himself so that he could see the reflection of the bathroom in the mirror. Nothing. He cautiously leaned his head inside, and there she was--or at least there the top of her head was--buried in the large, high-sided bathtub under a mountain of bubbles.

A soft smile tugged at Isaac’s mouth on reflex. It was just so… _cute_. Isaac couldn’t fight the unexpected warm feeling growing in his chest at the sight of an exhausted were-coyote half asleep in the bath. Just like that morning, Isaac felt the urge to just stay there and watch her, be with her.

Yeah. He definitely needed to talk to Malia.

* * *

MALIA

“You know you’re not supposed to fall asleep when you take a bath, right? People drown that way.”

Malia blinked awake at the sound of the voice that was becoming more and more familiar to her. “I wasn’t asleep.”

Isaac snorted. Malia shifted in the tub until she could peek up over the edge to see him leaning against the doorway, facing the opposite way. Malia rolled her eyes. Honestly, even if he hadn’t already seen her (or at least _felt_ her) mostly naked by now, Isaac’s sense of “propriety” or whatever was getting ridiculous. It wasn’t like he could see anything under all the bubbles anyway.

“And even if I was,” Malia allowed, “I’m pretty sure I’d wake up if my head went underwater.” 

“You’d probably choke on all those bubbles first.” Malia thought Isaac was smiling, but it was hard to tell from this angle. Malia liked the way Isaac smiled. Unlike most other people, Isaac’s mouth didn’t turn up on both sides when he smiled. Malia would’ve called his smile crooked, but crooked wasn’t usually a positive word. It was… different. But in a good way. Just like everything else about Isaac.

“I like the bubbles. They smell good and they make a crackly sound when they pop,” she said.

“Did you use the whole bottle?”

Malia made a face at Isaac’s back before sinking down lower into the tub, back into her bubble den. “I don’t tell _you_ how to take a bath.”

“I don’t take baths,” Isaac countered.

Malia sighed, irritated that Isaac wouldn’t just turn around and talk to her. If he was going to make fun of her, she should at least be allowed to look at his smirk. “You’re being annoying.”

“According to Stiles, that’s kinda my thing,” Isaac said to the door.

“Gimme that towel.” Malia pointed to the towel hanging next to the tub even though Isaac wasn’t facing that direction. He’d have to look at her eventually.

Isaac glanced back just long enough to see where she was pointing before facing forward again. “That’s my towel.”

Malia scowled. “So give me a _different_ towel.”

“Didn’t think this through, huh?” Isaac teased, but he still moved towards the cupboard beside the sink that they kept the extra towels in. Malia saw his eyes dart up at the mirror for a split second before glancing away.

“I thought it through fine except you weren’t supposed to be here,” said Malia, starting to grow frustrated with the situation. “If I get out you’ll see me naked, and you’ve made it pretty clear you don’t want to, so.”

At that, Isaac turned slightly and gave Malia this _… look_ over his shoulder. It only lasted a second, but it did something to her stomach. Isaac had said he wasn’t interested in doing anything more than sleeping in the same bed, right?

…Or had he? Before Malia had left Beacon Hills, Scott and Lydia had spent a full hour trying to explain to her the difference between guys being nice and guys being flirty, and how French guys were going to be _especially_ flirty and _expect_ stuff. At the time, Malia hadn’t cared. But now she was wishing she had paid more attention because then maybe she’d be able to tell if Isaac was being nice or being flirty.

Thinking about the possibility that Isaac might actually _want_ to see her naked meant that now Malia couldn’t help but think about it. And it was… nice, to think about. She didn’t really care if most people saw her naked, but the thought of Isaac seeing her, _wanting_ to see her, felt _different_ somehow. Different in a good way, like everything else related to Isaac. It made her wonder what it would be like to see _him_ naked, and that was an even nicer thought. But she knew enough about people now to know that it was the kind of thought you didn’t just tell someone, so she didn’t.

Malia took the towel that Isaac handed to her, but he left the bathroom without saying anything before she stood up. 

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac wouldn’t call it running away.

Isaac _would_ call it tactically withdrawing until the person he wanted to talk to had clothes on.

* * *

MALIA

Why did one _look_ from Isaac have Malia too nervous to open her--now their--bedroom door?

She hesitantly peeked her head out of the bathroom and--even though she had already known he wasn’t going to be in there--she was surprised by how disappointed she was when she didn’t see him. Disappointed and… relieved? How did those feelings even go together? Malia wasn’t sure she wanted to examine it too closely.

She found herself stalling, first by taking a long time to get dressed, then trying to shove the dresser drawers shut despite the clothing spilling out from them, making her--their--bed with clean sheets for the first time, hanging up her towel (also possibly for the first time since arriving in Paris)… But way too soon Malia had run out of reasons not to leave the bedroom.

What it really came down to, she realized, was that she didn’t want this to be a _thing_. Every time Malia had begun to feel like she was starting to understand how to be a person, Stiles or Scott or her dad or her therapist would come along and tell her what she was doing wrong and expect her to fix it. Which, okay, _fine_ , but then she was also expected to _talk_ about how she was feeling or what they could be doing to help her, and _that_ was just… frustrating. And exhausting. And boring.

Malia wasn’t good at talking. So far, she and Isaac had gotten along just fine without talking. But that _look_ … That look told her there was something unspoken going on that should probably be talked about. 

What if _talking_ with Isaac ruined how well they were getting along? What if, after they talked, Isaac decided they shouldn’t keep sleeping in the same bed? Malia _really_ liked sharing a bed with Isaac. She’d slept better last night than she had in a long time.

Plus she’d already moved his stuff. It would be annoying to move it all back.

Her nervousness about talking almost made her wish that Stiles were here. Stiles would’ve known exactly what to say. Or he wouldn’t have known, but he would’ve started talking anyway until the right words happened to come out. Or the wrong ones would come out, but he would’ve made them work somehow.

Stiles was always good at that. Too good. Infuriatingly good.

Malia hadn’t known Isaac and Stiles at the same time, but she wondered if Stiles had ever driven Isaac half as crazy as Stiles had driven her. If Stiles had always been… well, _Stiles_ , then she couldn’t imagine how he wouldn’t have.

Malia wondered if Stiles had ever tried to boss Isaac around or hidden things from Isaac the way that he had with her. Isaac would’ve hated that as much as she did. Maybe more. As far as Malia knew, Isaac didn’t _hate_ Stiles or anything, but he also didn’t bring him up, and the few times that Malia had mentioned him, Isaac had always seemed uncomfortable, so she figured they must not have been very good friends. If they weren’t friends, but they were both around Scott all the time, maybe they didn’t get along.

The possibility of conflict between Stiles and Isaac made Malia realize that she couldn’t imagine Isaac being really angry. They’d been wary of each other when she’d first arrived, but that was like two predators testing the borders of their territory. And sure, they didn’t always agree, but Isaac didn’t try to make decisions for Malia the way that Stiles had, which had been the cause of every single fight that Malia had ever had with Stiles.

Despite everything, including the fact that Malia was still kind of mad at Stiles and happy to be away from everyone so that she could “find herself” like all those travel guides and magazines had promised, Malia couldn’t help but miss Stiles sometimes. She hadn’t liked when he’d made decisions for her, but he’d been helpful in making decisions happen. Without Stiles there, Malia was realizing that maybe she wasn’t very good at making decisions on her own. If Stiles was here, he’d know what needed to be talked about with Isaac and where Malia should go after Paris and how to figure out how much “soul-searching” a person needed to do before they could go home.

But Stiles wasn’t here. He wasn’t even back in Beacon Hills anymore. He’d left to be a super cop or whatever and Malia had left to see the world or whatever and now she was trapped in a bedroom like a coward.

Fuck that.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac nearly jumped out of his skin when Malia wrenched her bedroom door open so hard it slammed back against the wall. From the way she stared at it in shock, Isaac didn’t think that Malia had done it on purpose. Still, probably best to tread carefully.

“Yeah, that door’s a dick to me, too,” he said, from the relative safety of the couch.

Malia glared at him. “It was an accident.”

“Okay, I believe you.” Isaac held his hands up in mock surrender. The effect was probably undermined by the coffee mug he still held in one hand, but Isaac thought he saw the corner of Malia’s mouth twitch in an involuntary smile. She stomped out of the living room (impressive considering her feet were bare) and towards the kitchen before Isaac could tell for sure.

A few minutes later, Malia returned with her own mug of coffee. She was no longer stomping, which Isaac took as a good sign, and she took a seat at the other end of the couch when Isaac moved his feet.

“So,” said Malia, offering Isaac exactly no ideas as to what to expect from this conversation.

“So,” Isaac mimicked. That got him another dirty look until he kept talking. “You moved my clothes?”

It wasn’t really a question, but Isaac figured that was as good a place as any to start.

“Yeah. Your room was too small. And the light sucks in the morning. And--” Malia abruptly cut herself off by shoving her face at the coffee mug in her hands and taking a large gulp of what Isaac knew to be still very hot coffee.

“So you want to keep sleeping tog-- uh, sleeping in the same bed?” This one was actually a question--one that made Isaac’s pulse elevate slightly as he remembered the sensation of waking up with a naked Malia pressed up against his back, and how the only things preventing him from seeing her naked a few minutes ago had been a thin layer of bubbles and an extraordinary amount of self control on his part.

Malia peeked out from behind her coffee mug. “You said we could if I want.”

“Something wrong with my bed?” Isaac raised an eyebrow at her, which she seemed to see as enough of a challenge that her tone turned defensive.

“I already said, my room is better.”

“Okay.” Isaac stifled a laugh. Her irritation was somehow cute to him, but he didn’t want her to think he was making fun of her. “You didn’t have to move my stuff, though. I could still sleep in your room and change in mine.”

Where someone else might’ve taken offense at the critique, Malia asserted her logic. “But a den’s supposed to have all your stuff in it.”

Isaac opened his mouth to respond, then closed it. Seen from a coyote’s perspective, Malia’s actions were incredibly thoughtful. Malia had lived alone in a den as a coyote for a decade. She’d liked being surrounded by familiar things, and even trapped in her coyote mind she’d risked her life to make sure her sister’s doll was in the right place. She probably figured Isaac would want all of his things in his ‘den,’ too.

“Well,” Isaac finally said, drawing out the word while he searched for the right thing to say. “Thanks for doing that. I’m just not sure everything’s going to fit in there.”

Malia let out a very coyote-like whine of frustration as she fell back against the couch, her eyes pinched shut. “Are you going to make me move all your stuff back? It took forever!”

That dumb, soft smile was trying to take over Isaac’s face again. “We could move some of mine and some of yours. The important stuff can stay in the den and the other stuff can go in my old room.” With his work clothes safely in the other room, he added mentally. He wouldn’t insult her by pointing out that he was going to have to iron them all after the way she’d shoved them in the wardrobe.

One of Malia’s eyes cracked open as she seemed to consider this option. “Okay. As long as the important stuff stays.” The other eye opened and Malia turned her face towards Isaac. “Can we do it now?”

“We definitely should if it takes as long as you said.” Isaac laughed in spite of himself as he got to his feet. Malia followed a second later, fumbling with her coffee cup before setting it down on the table. “I call top drawer!”

* * *

MALIA

With Isaac helping, it didn’t take nearly as long to get the bedrooms reorganized the second time. Malia didn’t have that much stuff with her anyway, so she offered Isaac more space in the drawers, but he said it should be equal and that there should be space in case she bought more clothes. So mostly Malia carried piles of Isaac’s folded clothes back into the other bedroom and put them wherever Isaac told her to. He was being so nice to her that she tried not to get annoyed at how neat he liked everything to be. It was his den, so he got to make the rules about where stuff should go. 

After they were done, they ate dinner and Isaac taught Malia how to make hot cocoa--“Spanish drinking chocolate” he had insisted--for dessert. They dipped flaky bits of croissant into the rich chocolate and Isaac laughed when Malia got it all over her hand trying to scrape the last of it out of the bowl. She didn’t mind Isaac’s laugh, though. She actually really liked it. Sometimes people laughed at Malia because she was doing something wrong and didn’t understand, and that made her angry. But Isaac never laughed at her like that. Malia had noticed that when they’d gone out to explore Paris, Isaac had kind of been on his guard, like he was waiting for an attack. It was nice that he felt safe around her. It made Malia feel special.

It was also going to be really nice sharing a bed with Isaac, she could already tell, even after just one night. It felt kind of like having Stiles back, except Isaac was taller, and he smelled different, and the bed was bigger. Plus, when she wasn’t sleeping alone, Malia didn’t usually feel the need to use her coyote form for warmth or the comforting simplicity of the animal’s thoughts. 

Isaac hadn’t outright asked Malia to wear clothes to bed, but when she noticed him wearing a T-shirt as he brushed his teeth that night--when he definitely hadn’t before--she decided to follow his lead and wear a T-shirt and underwear too. Malia still preferred sleeping naked, and privately thought that they would both be most comfortable and warmest without clothing, but she took her cue from her bedmate. And if she unknowingly stripped off her shirt in her sleep, well, Isaac could deal.

Malia eagerly followed Isaac into their newly-shared bedroom. She knew she was more excited than she should be, especially over something as simple as sharing a bed with someone again, but last night had made her realize that she’d really missed it. When she’d been a coyote, she hadn’t needed anyone, but things were different now that she’d been part of Scott’s pack. The human part of her wanted other people around in ways the coyote didn’t care as much about.

Which was why without even thinking, Malia curled herself around Isaac as soon as they were both under the blankets, playing what Stiles had called “the big spoon” with her arm and leg draped over Isaac’s body so she could stay close and nuzzle her face into his hair. His scent calmed both sides of her nature.

“Were you always on the outside like this with him?” Isaac asked, and Malia knew he meant Stiles. Malia thought she could sense a smile in Isaac’s voice, even though she couldn’t see one on his mouth. Just like when he’d been facing away in the bathroom. Was it possible to _hear_ a smile?

“Yeah,” said Malia, frowning at the thought that Isaac might think she was being silly. “He said he had to sleep in the middle of the bed. And I could protect him this way.”

The sound Isaac made in his throat definitely seemed to indicate amusement.

“So you’re ‘protecting’ me now?” he asked.

Malia shrugged. She honestly didn’t know. She hadn’t thought about it before. That was how she’d slept with Stiles, so it made sense to sleep that way with Isaac. Didn’t it?

“I could protect you for a change,” Isaac continued. He shifted over onto his back so they could see each other’s faces.

“I don’t need protecting,” Malia pointed out.

“Neither do I,” said Isaac.

That was a good point. “Okay. How do people who don’t need protecting sleep?”

Isaac considered her for a few seconds without speaking. Then he said, “Let’s try this.”

Malia tried to follow what Isaac was doing as he arranged her body so she was lying against his side but slightly on top of him. Her arm was still resting over his waist, but his arm was around her upper back.

“There,” he said softly with his face pressed into her hair. Maybe he liked her scent, too. “Now we can protect each other.”

Something about those words-- _we can protect each other_ \--made Malia’s stomach feel strangely… light. Or maybe it wasn’t the words. Maybe it was the way Isaac had said them. Or maybe both? Out of all the people that Malia had trouble reading, the hardest one was _herself_. Sometimes words or touches or facial expressions would make her feel things that she couldn’t get her head around. Not the feelings related to sex; those were simple and straightforward. But the feelings that seemed to live somewhere in her head, or inside her chest, or beneath her skin. Like, Stiles had this really specific smile that always made Malia feel warm, and now Isaac…

Malia shifted her body so she was even closer to Isaac and pressed her cheek into the soft spot between his collarbone and his shoulder. She didn’t want to think or talk anymore. It occurred to her that it would be polite to ask Isaac if he was comfortable, but she was asleep before she could open her mouth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> A note for the title of chapter 3, taken from https://takelessons.com/blog/french-quotes-z04
> 
> Meaning: It's easier to stop something from happening in the first place than to repair the damage after the fact.
> 
> Usage: French proverb akin to the saying “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”


	4. Petit a petit, l’oiseau fait son nid / Little by Little, the Bird Makes Its Nest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Isaac and Malia have some important conversations.

ISAAC

“That was a lot of stairs,” said Malia, gazing down at the impeccably neat green field below the tower. Isaac’s eyes were fixed on the protective bars as he let the cool breeze wash over his face, trying not to be too obvious as he gulped down deep breaths of the fresh air.

Neither of them had broken a sweat on the stairs up to the second deck, but Isaac’s anxiety about the elevator they would be taking for the last leg of the journey meant that he hadn’t had to pretend to put a human level of effort into the climb. They’d taken the stairs as far as they could, but Malia had wanted to go all the way to the top.

The top of the Eiffel Tower: A.K.A., one of Paris’s most claustrophobic tourist traps, although Isaac hadn’t thought about that before starting the climb. How Malia had convinced him to do dumb tourist stuff for a second weekend in a row, Isaac had no clue.

Well, that wasn’t actually true. Malia had held up her dog-eared guide book, mentioned how busy Isaac had been that week between his coursework at college and helping out with the kids, and then asked if he wanted to do something fun. It had taken remarkably little persuading for Isaac to agree.

Since Isaac was gone most days, Malia would tell him about whatever she had done while he’d been at school--“cleaned” the apartment, or discovered a new bakery, or walked through some famous graveyard her beloved guide book rated highly (Isaac was pleased that she was getting more comfortable going out on her own, despite not knowing the language)--in the evening over dinner. Then they’d throw on a movie, or some music if Isaac needed to study, and then fall into bed at some point. Malia had actually dragged Isaac into bed when he took too long one night, which Isaac still couldn’t tell if he’d found cute or controlling but had decided that it didn’t really matter because it was Malia.

Between Malia’s infectious interest in Paris and the persistent relief that still Isaac felt every time he thought about Luka getting the help he needed, Isaac had had little desire to stay inside his apartment alone on a beautiful Saturday. And even though he still didn’t know what to do about the various wolves who had been keeping an eye on them as they’d explored the touristy side of Paris yet again, he couldn’t bring himself to be as worried about them as he knew he should be.

It helped that whatever this was with Malia was easy. It was nice just to have one simple and uncomplicated thing in his life.

“Yeah,” said Isaac, still staring at the metal beneath his hands as he willed his pulse to calm and his breathing to even out. “Didn’t realize how far up it is.”

“You’ve never been up here before?” Malia asked, though her eyes were now on the horizon.

“Nah.” 

The thin bars of the metal safety web were cool beneath Isaac’s fingers. He didn’t like being in cages. At least this one was designed to keep him from falling to his death rather than to trap him, and it was definitely better than the crowded elevator, but it still wasn’t pleasant. 

Malia looked over at him. “But you’ve been in Paris for months!”

Isaac shrugged dismissively between slow, deep breaths.

“Scared of heights?” she guessed. Maybe she had noticed his distress after all.

Isaac shook his head, but he finally felt stable enough to look up at her. “It’s more about getting up to the heights.”

Malia cocked her head to the side, eyebrows knitted, until Isaac elaborated:

“Old cities, lots of people, small staircases… elevators.”

Malia’s eyes widened and she shoved at Isaac’s shoulder, scowling. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Even through the aftereffects of his claustrophobia, Isaac couldn’t help laughing at her indignation. “I wouldn’t’ve let you drag me here if I didn’t think I could handle it.”

It was true, but only just. Isaac had let Malia drag him to the top of the Eiffel Tower because he couldn’t resist her excitement about the idea. Despite Malia’s bluntness, impatience, and lack of tolerance for bullshit, she was also infectiously enthusiastic when something interested her.

“Ass,” she muttered, shivering when the wind gusted over them.

In true Malia fashion, she was impractically dressed for the adventure: ratty short shorts and a loose T-shirt (no bra; Malia insisted they were stupid and uncomfortable) with boots and a flannel shirt that served as a thin jacket. Her fashion sense (or lack thereof) marked her as a tourist to the Parisians, who Isaac tried to emulate so he could blend in. But if Malia had cared about what she looked like, she wouldn’t be half as attractive as she was now. 

“I appreciate your concern,” said Isaac, smirking. Malia’s concern was all the more valuable because Malia didn’t care about most people. She had to work hard just to register and catalog others’ emotions, let alone sympathize with them. It was nice to know that she thought he was worth the effort.

Malia looked put out. “How come you’re making fun of me for caring about you?”

 _Caring about him_. Isaac’s heart did a little fluttery thing he hoped the sound of the wind masked. Maybe it was his response to riding in a tiny capsule to the top of a building where he was trapped in a metal cage nearly a thousand feet above the ground, but he was feeling a bit emotionally unmoored.

“I’m not making fun of you,” he said truthfully. 

“Why are you smiling, then?” Malia crossed her arms over her chest. Isaac could see goosebumps on the parts of her arms that were revealed by the action.

“’Cause you’re ridiculous,” said Isaac. Malia looked about to object, but Isaac headed her off by removing his scarf--unlike Malia, he had anticipated that it might be cold near the top of the Eiffel Tower--and winding it once around her neck.

Her mouth had opened to speak, but she shut it again. Her fingers clutched wonderingly at the soft wool. The scarf had been a gift from Chris before he’d gone back to Beacon Hills. Despite having his own money now, Isaac still had a hard time justifying buying himself nice things.

Isaac was struck by the same feeling he’d had when he’d found Malia in the bath. She really was _cute_. It was a ridiculous notion considering what a strong, sometimes excessively violent badass she was, but it was true. Isaac wanted to tuck her unruly hair back behind her ears, but the wind would just whip it free again. He didn’t realize that his hands were still holding the ends of the scarf until Malia’s cold fingers were covering his knuckles. The knuckles her lips had touched on the day they’d had ice cream together.

There was no conscious decision, just a look in her wide brown eyes that made Isaac’s brain tell him that this was the appropriate thing to do. Her lips were cold from the wind when he kissed her, but they warmed when he didn’t pull away. Malia flung her arms around Isaac’s neck and stood up on her toes so they could keep kissing, like they’d done this a hundred times.

Like they weren’t having their first kiss at the top of the Eiffel Fucking Tower like two idiot foreigners falling in love on a study abroad trip.

* * *

MALIA

Malia shivered again when Isaac set her back on her feet. She thought he might tease her again, but he just unbuttoned his coat and tugged her up against his body so he could wrap some of the coat around her, too. She hid her cold cheek against Isaac’s chest and inhaled his scent. She wanted to look out at the view again, but her skin wanted to be close to his. And he had kissed her, so that meant that was what he wanted too, right?

She frowned when Isaac took her gently by the shoulders and repositioned her to face away from him. But then he bumped his nose against her cheekbone from behind and whispered in her ear:

“Look.”

Malia refused to leave the shelter of Isaac's coat, so she dragged him right behind her when she pressed up close against the bars to get the best possible view. She'd never been anywhere so big or so old or so full of people. She understood now that these things made Paris hard for Isaac, but she couldn't help loving this place. She was finally far away enough from everything and everyone in Beacon Hills that she could actually feel like her own person. No one here knew to fear or pity her. No one told her what to do. Here there was only Isaac with his arms wrapped around her waist and his heartbeat strong against her back.

“Next time we'll go somewhere you want to go that makes me nervous,” she promised, eyes still drinking in the tiny buildings below.

“Right.” Isaac huffed a laugh against the top of her head. “Like anything makes you nervous.”

Malia liked that about Isaac: he never underestimated her. Looking back on it, she appreciated Stiles’s guidance when she’d needed him to tell her how to navigate the frustratingly complicated world of human social interaction. But there had been times when he’d been so protective of her that she’d found herself doubting her ability to do something on her own. She knew it had been because he cared about her, that he wanted to take care of her, but it frustrated her. And she’d never been able to find a way to tell him that just because she could take care of herself, that didn’t mean she didn’t need Stiles. She would always need Stiles, in a way, even though that thought hurt so she didn’t let herself think about it very much. But Isaac was… easier. Maybe it was good that Stiles had always pushed her to be a better person, but Malia was tired of being a better person. If she had to be human--and she knew that she did--Malia just wanted to _be human_. Isaac let her be, and he showed her that she could _be_ without being alone. Malia hoped that maybe she let Isaac be like that, too.

The stupid elevator man wouldn’t let them stay at the top of the tower forever. Isaac clutched Malia so tightly on the way back down that she could feel bruises forming on her arm and hip. They’d heal, though. She ignored the way other people in the elevator stared at them while she nuzzled at his neck and kissed his collarbone and made soothing coyote sounds against him until they were free from the elevator. She wished she could shift into her other form so she could lie on him and let him pet her fur until he calmed down, but Isaac had said that a coyote didn’t look enough like a dog for Malia to be shifted in public. So she led him down the stairs to the green field below and pushed him onto the ground. She half-covered his body with hers like when they were in bed, and pressed her ear to his heart so she could listen as his pulse slowed down to normal.

“Sorry,” he whispered finally. His voice was a little shaky. 

Malia rolled her eyes even though he couldn’t see it and made a sound that told him he was being stupid.

“I don’t like being trapped, either,” she admitted. “People were always trying to trap me when I lived in the woods.”

“Sorry,” he said again, and this time she knew it was because he had been part of the group that had tried to catch her.

Malia shrugged. “I’m over it. Mostly.”

There was a long, comfortable silence between them before Isaac asked, “Do you wish you were still there? In the woods?”

Another pause while Malia sorted through her complicated feelings. Feelings hadn’t been complicated when she’d lived in the woods.

“Not today,” she said finally. 

She lifted her head, lips finding Isaac’s and kissing him. It was thrilling, freeing, to be allowed to kiss him. She’d been thinking about it since that first moment they’d woken up in bed together. Not a lot, but enough to know that she wanted to. Kissing him didn’t feel weird at all, though. She wanted to do more of it. But she needed to be sure…

He was smiling when the kiss broke, which she took as a good sign, but still:

“It’s okay if I kiss you?”

Isaac’s smile widened. He had a beautiful smile. “I think I can live with it.”

“Whenever I want?” she pressed.

Instead of answering right away, Isaac put his hand at the back of her head and pulled her down for another kiss.

“Within reason,” he said after he let her go.

“What’s within reason?”

He was smiling again. “I’ll tell you when it’s not okay. Does that work?”

Malia felt her lips matching his smile. “Yeah.”

Isaac threw his weight and tumbled Malia over onto her back, kissing her again and again until she could barely breathe but didn’t care. It was a joyful thing, kissing him. Like running through the woods at night as fast as she could, paws springing back from damp earth. The wind around them was chilly, but Isaac’s body was warm, and the sun was breaking free of the clouds, and everything was beautiful and wonderful and _right_.

* * *

ISAAC

Four hours and two national landmarks later, Isaac hadn’t been able to stop yawning. He had tried to tell Malia it was just because he’d had a long week, not because he was bored, but she’d insisted that they go home for dinner. She’d even cooked.

“My dad taught me,” she’d said, and since she hadn’t seemed eager to expand on that, Isaac hadn’t asked.

Isaac hadn’t been sure what would change between them after their kiss earlier, but he was glad that spending time with Malia was as easy as it had been before. He was mostly relieved and only a little disappointed that Malia hadn’t immediately pushed for more between them and had instead shoved him onto the couch before making herself comfortable at the other end and turning on the TV.

Caring less about what they were watching than the fact that they were watching it together, they’d landed on some American movie that was dubbed in French, which neither of them had seen before. Isaac had been trying to translate for Malia, but the dialogue was very quick, and she’d been getting more and more restless for the past fifteen minutes. Isaac could practically keep time by the bouncing of her feet against his leg.

“This is boring,” Malia complained after about a half hour.

“What do you want to do, then?” Isaac asked.

Before he had even finished his question, Malia was up and crawling into his lap, facing away from the TV and straddling his legs. It brought their hips perilously close together, and suddenly Isaac was so uninterested in the movie he barely heard it in the background.

Instead of answering out loud, she kissed him. They’d stolen kisses from one another periodically throughout the day, so the new position was a strange change, with Malia’s head far enough above Isaac’s that she was the one leaning down. Isaac found that he liked it, though. His body relaxed back into the couch, hands rising to rest on Malia’s hips on instinct as she deepened the kiss, and he was just wondering if maybe she wanted him to put them somewhere else, when she pulled back and slid her arms behind his neck, hugging him instead.

As his own arms wrapped around Malia’s waist, his head fell to rest on her shoulder. It was a strange and wonderful thing, how natural it felt to hold and be held by her. It was strange and wonderful, too, that she thought hugging him was more interesting than watching a movie. As her body relaxed against his, he pressed his face to the collar of her shirt.

And then a sudden, visceral shock of recognition: Stiles’s scent. Faint but unmistakable, Stiles’s scent was on Malia’s shirt. No, Stiles’s scent was on _Stiles’s_ shirt, which Malia must’ve kept after they’d stopped seeing each other because Malia apparently didn’t have the same kinds of hang-ups most humans did about their exes.

Isaac’s world shifted, tipped sideways, even though his body was steady in Malia’s hold. Thoughts and feelings were rushing through him so quickly and intensely that Isaac felt battered by the force of the mental storm. Malia’s scent surrounded him, its feminine notes not completely overwhelmed by Isaac’s shampoo and body wash and detergent. But Stiles was there now, too.

‘This belonged to Stiles,’ Isaac wanted to say to Malia as he nosed closer to the Stiles-ness that lingered in the shirt. ‘ _You_ belonged to Stiles.’

Isaac had never known Malia as Stiles’s girlfriend--actually, he’d never really known her at all before Paris--and for that he was infinitely grateful. He had a feeling that if he had even one memory, a real-life image of Stiles and Malia together, he might not be able to see her as wholly his own. And it felt so good to think of her as his, and to hope that maybe she thought of him as hers. He and Malia fit together. They protected each other.

And if that was true, why should the past matter? He wasn’t jealous that Malia had been with Stiles before him. In a way, he was _glad_ that they’d had each other when they’d needed it. Hell, Isaac certainly hadn’t made Stiles’s life any easier when everything had been going to shit. But if he wasn’t jealous, why did the scent of Stiles on Malia cause such an _ache_ in him?

Understanding swept over Isaac in a painful wave. It wasn’t jealousy. It was _regret_. Regret that this was the closest Isaac had ever been to knowing Stiles in a way that wasn’t “just friends” (well, “just frenemies” might be more appropriate). Regret that this was the closest he would ever be. Regret that he’d never had the guts to find out whether his childhood crush was actually flirting back. Regret that he’d never called that bluff.

…Regret that he hadn’t seen Stiles and Malia together. A surprising, bewildering, tantalizing thought. That fantasy that had flashed through his mind the first time he’d woken up with Malia in his bed seemed different now that he felt something more for Malia. Holding Malia now with the spectre of Stiles between them, Isaac allowed himself to imagine what it would be like to call _both_ of them his own.

Ridiculous.

There was no point regretting things he hadn’t said or done with Stiles, especially when he had Malia now. Isaac lifted his head, tucked Malia’s hair back behind her ears, and kissed her slowly, savoring the contact. When he pulled back, she was giving him a smile that made the very notion of regret seem utterly absurd. Isaac was tired of overthinking every good thing that happened to him. He kissed her again.

“I want ice cream,” she declared emphatically as she suddenly broke the kiss. And he knew that what she meant was, ‘We are going to find somewhere that sells ice cream at this time of night and we are going to go there right now.’

“Let me grab my coat,” Isaac agreed. Then he added, “Don’t forget yours this time.”

* * *

MALIA

Malia wanted Isaac. She really did. But she also wanted ice cream, and now she didn’t have to choose between them. Ice cream with Isaac now, kissing Isaac more later.

* * *

ISAAC

Malia had, of course, forgotten her jacket despite Isaac’s reminder. Thirty seconds after arriving at the metro station to wait for the train that would take them to the only parlour Isaac could find that stayed open until midnight, Malia had pulled at Isaac until he was draped over her shoulders with his arms wrapped around her from behind to keep her warm. Not that Isaac was complaining.

It was better to think about the way Malia felt in his arms than how sure Isaac was that the walls of the underground metro station were slowly closing in on them. Luckily the trains ran often enough that even late at night they would only have to wait a few minutes for the next one. Not that getting on the train once it arrived would help any, but at least then Isaac could focus on the feeling of moving and pretend that they were above ground and it was too dark outside to see out the windows.

But until then, Isaac planned to just close his eyes and hide his face in Malia’s hair and think about how soft Stiles’s shirt was under his fingers and how pleasantly the scent of Malia’s hair intermingled with the scent on the shirt.

“Isaac.” Malia nudged him in the side with her elbow.

“Hm?” Isaac kept his face determinedly hidden in Malia’s hair, reluctant to leave the impromptu scent-fort.

“Are those guys trying to hit on me?”

Isaac lifted his head, his always-in-the-background alertness overriding his claustrophobic discomfort. “Which guys?”

Malia squirmed around in his hold until she had wrapped her arms around Isaac’s waist without him letting go. 

“Those guys on the platform across from us,” she managed to get out through a yawn against his chest. “They were staring at me and whistling and saying stuff to each other. That means they’re hitting on me, right?”

Malia hadn’t needed to point the guys out, though. As soon as Isaac had looked up, he’d been able to tell who she meant. 

They’d moved on from whistling and were making some provocative gestures while calling across the tracks, asking in French if Malia was shy. 

“They’re…” Isaac trailed off, not really sure how to tackle the topic of sexual harassment from strangers in public with the girl that he was now sleeping with and was maybe going to be _sleeping with_ at some point, if things went how he hoped they would.

“They think you’re, uh… attractive,” Isaac said carefully.

Malia blinked up at Isaac, realization dawning. “Oh! It’s what Lydia was saying about how French guys might try to flirt with me and have _expectations_."

Isaac knew from experience that Lydia wasn’t wrong. He’d seen more public displays of affection (welcome and otherwise) since moving to Paris than he ever had growing up in Beacon Hills. Even the stuff that these guys across the station were saying was nothing particularly unusual; Isaac had just never been this close to the receiving end before. He didn’t like it.

“They’re just being rude. Ignore them.”

If only Isaac could take his own advice. He caught his arms instinctively holding Malia tighter against him and took a deep breath to keep his eyes from shifting.

* * *

MALIA

It was, surprisingly, Isaac’s tone that let Malia know that something was wrong. He didn’t sound mad, but his voice was suddenly sharper, like all of the softness that Malia hadn’t realized he’d been speaking with was gone.

Usually, when Malia was trying to figure out what people weren’t saying, body language and expressions were easier for her to judge, but with Isaac wrapped up around her so tightly and his face so… blank… the tone of his voice and the fact that his body had stiffened slightly were all Malia had.

Malia took a deep breath, thinking about the werewolves she smelled almost every time she left Isaac’s apartment now but had still never seen. But the only wolf she smelled here was Isaac.

“What’s wrong?” Malia asked. She fought the urge to look around, instead focusing on Isaac and trusting him to watch their surroundings.

She heard a train rumble far off down the tunnel.

Isaac shrugged around her.

Malia pinched his hip, causing his body to jerk slightly away from her. 

“Tell me,” she demanded and tightened her grip on him so he couldn’t squirm away from her. 

“It’s nothing,” said Isaac.

Malia didn’t like the way the tunnels messed with her ability to hear things well. She couldn’t hear those guys anymore, but she didn’t know if that was because they’d stopped talking or because the train was drowning them out. She also couldn’t hear if Isaac was lying, but she knew people well enough by now to know that ‘It’s nothing’ almost always meant ‘It’s something.’

“Is it those guys?”

Isaac sighed and kind of half-shook his head in a way that Malia couldn’t interpret as either a yes or a no. She pulled her upper body back enough that she could see more of his face.

“I need you to explain what you mean,” said Malia. It was language from her therapist, part of a list of phrases to use in confusing conversations. She hated how awkward the words sounded, but she also hated not understanding.

“I don’t know what I’m feeling,” said Isaac. “I just didn’t like them saying stuff like that.”

“Stuff like what?”

"That they, uh, want to… have sex with you?" His tone sounded like a question, but it wasn’t really a question as far as Malia could tell. Isaac lifted his arm from around her to rub at the back of his neck.

Malia frowned. “Is that a bad thing?”

“No!” Isaac said quickly and shook his head, then made a frustrated sound. “I don’t know how to explain. I’m sorry. I just… I don’t like hearing people talk about you that way.”

“You don’t think people should say they want to have sex with me?”

Isaac sighed and rubbed at his face this time. His muscles were tense beneath Malia’s fingers. “I don’t know. It’s not like that. Fuck, I don’t know what I mean.”

Malia’s frown deepened as Isaac began to seem more and more uncomfortable. She’d thought Isaac was attracted to her, but maybe that didn’t mean sex. Otherwise why would he be so awkward about it? She had to know for sure.

“Do _you_ want to have sex with me?”

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac’s brain stuttered. He couldn’t have thought of a more loaded question Malia could’ve asked if he’d tried. It was a simple question, but no one ever just asked that kind of question so openly and directly.

On the surface, his answer was simple: an unequivocal yes. Isaac _did_ want to have sex with Malia. But he hadn’t expected this conversation to happen so soon, or to happen in this venue. He was still taken aback sometimes by the intensity of his physical and emotional responses to Malia, and even more so by how quickly they’d developed. They’d only kissed for the first time earlier that day, after all. 

It wasn’t as though Isaac had never felt experienced casual sexual activity before, but his feelings during those encounters hadn’t been this _… intense_. Even with Allison--Isaac’s stomach dropped for a split second at the thought of her--he’d never had a visceral response to other guys showing interest in someone he was involved with. Was it jealousy? It didn’t feel quite like that. Possessiveness? Protectiveness? He still couldn’t articulate it. All he knew was that even though Malia was an adult and a badass were-coyote who could take care of herself if she was receiving unwanted attention, he still bristled at the idea of anyone doing or saying anything that might make her feel uncomfortable or vulnerable. 

Isaac could feel his ears start to burn as he grasped mentally for the right thing to say. Luckily, she saved him from having to respond.

“Because I like sex,” Malia continued matter-of-factly, as if she were declaring that she liked chocolate or the color yellow.

“Sex can, uh, be pretty awesome,” Isaac agreed, if a bit awkwardly.

“But I don’t want to have sex with any of them.” Malia wrinkled her nose.

“Me neither,” Isaac joked, latching on to humor as a way to get through this fraught conversation. “They're not really my type.”

“Because they’re guys?” Malia asked. It was an offhand, almost innocent question, like someone had explained sexual orientation to her but she still didn’t quite understand it, and maybe thought it was stupid. Isaac had the sense that Malia felt that way about a lot of things.

“Nah, they’re just skeezy and not very attractive.” Isaac wasn’t going to pretend to be straight, but he silently hoped Malia wouldn’t grab hold of the implicit admission of his bisexuality, because he wasn’t really in the mood to have a deep conversation about it. Especially not when discussing sex with a girl he really wanted to have sex with. A girl who also happened to have dated his secret long-time crush.

“Exactly,” Malia agreed, as if Isaac hadn’t said anything unusual at all. “You're way hotter than they are.”

Isaac felt heat rush to his face, undermining his efforts to appear unaffected. “I am?”

“Uh-huh.” Malia nodded emphatically. “I’d have sex with you.”

Isaac nearly choked. The only response he could manage was a shaky, “Yeah?”

“Of course!” Malia gave him an incredulous look, like he was asking a nonsensical question and she wasn’t sure if he was being serious. Then she frowned uncertainly. “You didn’t answer my question before. Would you want to have sex with me?”

In the face of such a direct question, with Malia looking at him like that, Isaac found that the only possible response was the simple truth: “Malia, I’ve wanted to have sex with you since like a week after you showed up. Anyone who’s into girls should want to have sex with you.”

Malia beamed at Isaac like he’d just given her the sweetest compliment she’d ever heard.

* * *

MALIA

Suddenly, Malia was okay with waiting until tomorrow for ice cream. Her stomach felt light with excitement and her skin itched to be even closer to Isaac’s body.

“We can go home now if you want,” she whispered, because the words felt private even though there was nothing actually private-sounding about them.

Isaac smiled as he whispered back, “I promised you ice cream. Too late to turn back now.”

Something about those words, _Too late to turn back now_ , seemed to carry more meaning than they should’ve.

They shared one ice cream this time, passing it back and forth at first, then holding the cone together and alternating licks. At some point, Isaac’s mouth was on her knuckles, and then they were kissing again. The ice cream tasted good, but Isaac tasted better, and Malia knew enough about human rules to know that, even in Paris, she couldn’t get everything she wanted from him in public. So she threw the rest of the ice cream away, grabbed Isaac’s hand, and tugged him with her to the metro station.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac struggled with the front door lock, more than a little distracted by the way Malia was standing on tip-toes to graze her teeth over his throat. He nearly lost his balance when the door gave way and he stumbled into the apartment with Malia practically glued to his side.

“Lock the door,” he gasped, because she wasn’t letting him move back close enough to it to reach the bolt.

Malia fumbled behind her and succeeded in locking the door without letting go of the fistful of Isaac’s shirt she’d grabbed. Then she growled playfully at Isaac and backed him up until his calves hit the front of the couch. He let her shove him down onto it and climb into his lap.

It was like they’d never left for ice cream. Except now they’d admitted to each other that they wanted to have sex. So now, instead of trying to be good and not make assumptions or move too fast, Isaac’s head was spinning with thoughts of what he wanted to do with Malia.

Even if it was okay for them to move fast, though, Isaac still liked Malia, so this felt important.

“Not to kill the mood or anything,” Isaac managed to gasp out as Malia nipped at his neck, “but maybe we should move to the bed?”

There was a pause before Malia looked up and assessed Isaac with a quizzical expression. “Why?”

Isaac swallowed, suddenly self-conscious. “We don’t have to if you don’t want to,” he said quickly. “I just figured since we haven’t done this before, it should be…”

Malia cocked her head to the side. “Comfortable?”

“Special,” said Isaac, and felt his face immediately flush. Malia would probably think he was being weird or sappy or something.

But the way her face lit up told Isaac he’d been wrong to worry. Without another word, Malia climbed off of Isaac and rolled into a standing position in one fluid movement, grabbed his hand to drag him to his feet, and tugged him toward the bedroom they now shared.

Isaac couldn’t help but laugh as Malia practically threw him down onto the bed. She nearly knocked the wind out of him as she flung herself on top of him and pinned his arms, grinning down at him in victory. He used her cockiness as an opportunity to throw his weight, tumbling them both over so that he was straddling her hips.

She was trying her best to look affronted at the turnabout, but when he bent to kiss her again, slow and deep, she went boneless beneath him. He lifted his head and met wide-pupiled eyes glowing blue, all trace of annoyance or even humor gone, replaced by an expression that made Isaac’s stomach clench and his mouth go dry.

“You are so fucking beautiful,” he heard himself whisper.

There was a quiet, fragile moment where Malia reached up and ran her fingers through Isaac’s hair like he was something lovely and precious. It did things to Isaac’s heart that he wasn’t prepared to confront. And then, without warning, she leaned up and playfully bit his lower lip.

Isaac’s exclamation of shock sent Malia into a fit of giggles, which Isaac accelerated by tickling her sides. Soon they were rolling and play-fighting all over the bed, laughing as they ruined half of each other’s clothes in their efforts to remove them. Stiles’s shirt remained intact, ending up scrunched somewhere near the head of the bed.

When Malia succeeded in pinning him again, Isaac surrendered. He was again surprised and a little disconcerted by how comfortable he felt with Malia, how easily he trusted her. Isaac was often wary about being physically vulnerable with strong partners. While their strength was part of what attracted him to them, even a well trained human--as Allison had demonstrated with all the _stabbing_ \--could do a lot of damage if he let his guard down. And yet he trusted a were-coyote who playfully bit his throat. Something inside him, some kind of wolf instinct or human gut feeling, told Isaac that no matter how rough their play got (because rough could be fun when it was safe), this fellow predator would never use her strength to injure him.

Plus it wasn’t exactly a hardship to lie beneath Malia while her hands and her lips roamed over his skin like she was so excited to touch him that she couldn’t decide what she wanted to do first. Isaac had never felt so desired. He’d also never felt so at ease with another person. Malia didn’t expect anything from him. She just liked being with him, and he could tell she was happy that he liked being with her.

They played there together, safe in their den, learning each other in new ways.

After, Malia lay half on top of Isaac’s body like they usually did when they fell asleep, though this time both of them were naked and in need of a shower. Isaac could feel her pulse beating against his own chest, hear it slowly calming in time with his. He absently stroked his fingers through her hair, again and again, and reveled in the feeling of her skin on his.

Basking in Malia’s softness and scent, Isaac nuzzled at her hair, only to find his face pressed to a ball of cloth nestled between the pillows. One inhalation told him it was Stiles’s shirt. Isaac’s sex-drunk senses seemed to magnify the scent, weaving it into this rare moment of complete contentment. The distant spark of logic in Isaac’s brain feebly protested that another man’s scent shouldn’t be welcome in bed with him and Malia, but the rest of him found it strangely comforting. The scent on the shirt would never be unwelcome to Isaac or the wolf inside him.

Malia finally shifted, drawing Isaac out of his thoughts as she leaned her mouth toward his ear.

“ _Now_ can I brush my teeth while you’re in the shower?”

Isaac rolled his eyes at her whisper and gently shoved at her shoulder, but he couldn’t quite hide his smile. Malia snickered in appreciation of her own joke, and he squeezed her arm and kissed the top of her head, even though that would only encourage her. But he liked encouraging her. He liked watching the way she met every new experience with enthusiasm. For so long, Isaac had been afraid to enjoy anything, because enjoying something meant that it could be revoked as a punishment. Malia enjoyed everything without ever seeming to worry that someone would take it away from her.

And now Isaac enjoyed Malia, more than he’d realized or even thought possible. Which reminded him of the inevitable: she’d leave soon. This wasn’t her home. Isaac’s smile faded as he trailed his fingers lightly up and down Malia’s back, memorizing the feel of her even as he instinctively tried to prepare himself for losing her. It was probably for the best, he thought as he stared at the ceiling, that Malia had made him move rooms. Now, when she left, he wouldn’t spend every night thinking about how she had slotted herself into his life so quickly and then just as quickly left. He’d move his stuff back into his old room and life would go on.

It couldn’t last forever. Isaac knew that. But for now it was good. For now it was _right_. He’d deal with the rest when the time came.

* * *

MALIA

“Yes,” Isaac called from their bedroom, even though Malia hadn’t said anything. It had been nice lying in bed with Isaac after sex, but she didn’t like going to sleep dirty, and she loved showers.

“What?” she asked, reveling in the pleasant soreness of her muscles and the way the hot water eased the ache. The small bruises that Isaac’s fingers and teeth had left in her skin were nearly healed, and she was almost sad to see them go. Her eyes slid shut as she traced her fingers across the marks. Malia loved showers, and she loved sex. She’d forgotten how much she loved sex. And she was delighted to find out that sex with Isaac was _fun_.

“Yes,” Isaac repeated, his voice closer, “you can brush your teeth while I’m in the shower now.”

Malia grinned and blinked her eyes open. “Finally!”

“But first you have to shower with me.”

Malia turned to face Isaac as he stepped into the tub and nudged her aside so he could share the spray.

“Okay,” she happily agreed. “Can I stop wearing clothes when I sleep? They’re itchy.”

“Definitely.” He was trying to look serious, but Malia knew his face and his voice well enough now that she could see him trying not to smile.

“And you should stop wearing them, too.” Malia let her eyes wander over Isaac’s body, just because she liked looking at him and she was allowed to now.

Isaac caught her watching him. “Oh yeah?” He looked her up and down and smirked.

“Yeah. You feel good.” She couldn’t help sliding her hand across his chest, up over his shoulder and down his arm. His skin was smooth and warm from the shower.

Isaac shivered even though he definitely wasn’t cold. “You feel good, too.”

When his arm slipped around her waist, Malia tipped her head back so she could look up at him. “And can we have sex whenever I want?”

“Within reason,” said Isaac, like he’d said when she’d asked him if she could kiss him whenever she wanted.

“So you’ll tell me when I can’t?” she asked, remembering what he’d said then.

“Exactly.”

“Then I want to do it now,” said Malia. They’d had good sex, and he was barely touching her now, but just looking at him made her want more. And why shouldn’t she? It wasn’t like Isaac had to get up early for class the next day.

“Again?” Isaac raised one of his eyebrows. “Already?”

“Yes.” Malia’s confidence faltered for a moment. “Unless you don’t want t--”

Her words were cut off by Isaac’s mouth nearly crashing into hers, his eagerness unmistakable. As he pressed her up against the tile wall, she hooked her arms around his neck and wondered how she could’ve been stupid enough to doubt him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally some Isaalia action! Thank you all for reading. We really appreciate the love and encouragement.
> 
> A note for the title of chapter 4, taken from https://www.fluentu.com/blog/french/french-proverbs
> 
> This proverb designates patience and perseverance. It can be used in many situations, particularly in the process of something not yet accomplished, as opposed to something that has been accomplished. And only then, after much time and effort, one might also say (with a pronounced sense of triumph and achievement), “Paris ne s’est pas fait en un jour!” (“Paris was not made in a day!”)


	5. La raison c’est la folie du plus fort. La raison du moins fort c’est de la folie. / Reason is the Madness of the Strongest. The Reason of Those Less Strong is Madness.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Isaac and Malia unleash their inner hounds, and Isaac has nowhere else to turn.

MALIA

 _Stiles has so many different faces. The one he makes when he’s concentrating. The one when he’s too tired to keep his eyes open. The one when he’s surprised, but also surprised that he’s surprised. Sometimes Malia doesn’t completely understand what his face is saying, but she knows this one well. It’s one of her favorites. It’s the face that means he_ wants _her. Stiles makes this face whenever he sees her naked. He makes it when she kisses him. Sometimes he makes it when she doesn’t think she’s doing anything different at all._

_This is one of those times. Malia was literally just standing next to Stiles’s Jeep waiting for him to finish class, and now Stiles is standing three feet away from her, his gaze traveling from the toes of her boots to the top of her head. His eyes are dark when they meet hers._

_“_ God _, you’re sexy.”_

_He’s said the word “God” like he’s in pain. Like Malia is so attractive it hurts him. Like if he doesn’t get to touch her soon he’ll die. It makes Malia’s pulse race, her stomach clench, her palms sweat. It makes her feel an almost-pain touch-hunger for him, too._

_Malia shields Stiles’s back with her forearm so she won’t hurt him when she slams him up against the side of his Jeep. His mouth finds hers. They kiss with lips and tongues and teeth. His fingers are tangled in her hair. Her eyes are shut tight because she can feel them burning blue. She can smell how much he wants sex and she wishes he could smell her too so he’d understand. She tries to tell him with her body. She can feel him against her stomach. She wishes they were both naked._

_Stiles rips his mouth away from hers. “Not here.”_

_Malia whines a coyote sound and tries to kiss him again, but he lays his forearm across her collarbone to gently hold her back._

_“In the Jeep?” she asks hopefully._

_Stiles enthusiastically nods, so Malia lets him go so they can both get into the car._

_When she tries to crawl into his lap, he holds her away from him again. His eyes are so hungry, and she wants to fix it, but he shakes his head. “Gotta at least drive somewhere else first.”_

_Reluctantly, Malia buckles herself into the passenger seat. She doesn’t take her eyes off of Stiles for the entire drive to the preserve. Every now and then Stiles glances over at her, then quickly away. Malia wants so badly to touch him, but she doesn’t want to distract him from driving. A car wreck would delay sex._

_Finally,_ finally _, Stiles parks the Jeep in the woods. Malia decides that the steering wheel will get in the way, so she drops her seat back and drags Stiles over to her. It’s awkward and cramped and wonderful. They can’t get their clothes off because they can’t stop kissing and clinging to each other. Stiles smells and tastes so good. Malia is sure she’ll never get tired of this, never stop hungering for Stiles, never…_

Malia drifted awake lying across a warm body. A boy. She sleepily inhaled his scent as she nuzzled her face into his shoulder. Not Stiles. _Isaac_. She could feel the difference now: the position they were lying in, the breadth of Isaac’s chest, the length of his body. Malia slowly ran her hand across Isaac’s chest, enjoying the smoothness of his skin beneath her palm and the fact that she could pet him as much as she wanted to.

She could do _more_ than pet Isaac now. She could have sex with him. She could kiss and touch and play with him and not worry about _boundaries_ anymore. She had freedom to be close to him. The kind of freedom she’d used to have with Stiles, before he’d broken her trust.

Maybe that was why she’d dreamed about Stiles. Dreamed a version of a memory. Her body remembered him so well, even when she’d tried to make her brain forget. She didn’t like thinking about the bad feelings, about not being close to Stiles anymore, about saying goodbye. Stiles had been hers, and she’d been his.

And she’d said she’d never leave him behind.

Malia frowned as a tight ache suddenly formed in her chest. She stopped petting Isaac, her fingers catching the edge of the blanket and gripping it as she hid her face in his shoulder and curled in on herself against his side.

Isaac stirred beneath her. She was already lying on top of one of his arms, and he used it to pull her closer. His other hand found hers and gently untangled her fingers from the blanket. He raised her hand to his mouth to press a kiss to her knuckles, then laid it back flat on his chest.

“You okay?” he whispered against her hair.

Malia had to swallow before she could find her voice. “I think so.”

“If last night was weird or someth--”

“No,” Malia said quickly, anxious to reassure Isaac that everything between them was okay. She never wanted to hear unsureness in his voice again. “It was… right.”

Isaac sighed out a breath like he’d been holding it, even though he’d just talked.

“Yeah,” Isaac agreed. He stroked his fingers through her hair as he said, “We should do that more.”

Malia lifted her head so she could catch Isaac’s eyes.

“Now?” she asked, suddenly fully awake.

She felt Isaac’s laugh against her chest and stomach, which made her smile.

“Okay, but gimme a minute to brush my teeth so I can kiss you.”

“Deal!” Malia grinned and threw the covers off, not caring at all about the cold air on her naked skin because she knew Isaac’s body would warm hers back up again soon. She jumped out of bed before Isaac could get up, laughing as she raced him to the bathroom.

* * *

ISAAC

Things were really good with Malia for a while. Better than good. They were great. Isaac couldn’t remember a time when he’d felt so at ease. He got to wake up naked with Malia in a warm bed and go to sleep the same way. In between, when Isaac wasn’t at school or work, there was sex and cuddling and meals and exploring the city. When Isaac had to do homework, Malia entertained herself or shifted into a coyote and napped next to him until he could take a break.

It was completely unexpected, but it was perfect. It was so perfect, in fact, that if Isaac thought about it too hard, it scared him. Nothing in his life went this well. _Ever_. Things as good as this simply did not happen to Isaac Lahey. No relationship had been this effortless or uncomplicated. He had never felt as at ease with another person on a basic, almost instinctual level, as he did with Malia. And she let Isaac kiss and touch and fuck and hold and even _snuggle_ her like it was the most natural thing in the world. Like she wanted it as badly as he did. Isaac wasn’t sure if he was in love with Malia, because he didn’t really know what being in love felt like, but he loved being with her, and he never got tired of her. As long as Malia was in reach, Isaac could feel something that might almost be called happiness.

Which meant, naturally, that it was only a matter of time before everything went to hell.

Parisian werewolves were dicks.  
  
That wasn’t just Isaac's opinion, either. The werewolves there were dicks. They knew it, Isaac knew it, everybody knew it. Everybody except for Malia, apparently. Because Isaac hadn’t warned her the way that Chris had warned him.

On the flight over Chris had said that older packs were different in Europe, more structured. More territorial.

“As long as you stay in a city, you should be alright, since street fights tend to bring the _gendarmes_ and no one wants that, but out in the countryside, lone wolves are targets.”

Between Chris’s knowledge of pack power dynamics and his advice about what Isaac should expect as an omega, Isaac had wanted to ask how Chris had gotten his information but could never quite bring himself to ask. Isaac found that he didn’t want to imagine Chris in the position of torturer.

Isaac had had time to get used to the way yellow eyes would sometimes flash ominously at him from across a café or bar. If Isaac hadn’t mastered the art of looking unimpressed when threatened before, he certainly had after living in Paris for a year and a half. It was a skill he was glad he’d cultivated, even if he wasn’t quite so grateful about needing it in the first place. He’d take his time finishing his coffee or his wine and take it as a sign that it was time to find a new place to drink. No big deal.  
  
Malia, on the other hand, took it as a sign to dig her heels in, glare at them, and order another round. When that happened, the Paris wolves would almost always glare back, maybe throwing in a contemptuous sneer for good measure--none of which really bothered Isaac since that happened sometimes with regular, non-werewolf Parisiens anyway when they realized Isaac and Malia were American--but so far, they hadn’t done anything to actively chase Isaac and Malia off. Yet.

Sure, a woman had been following them along the Seine that first day when he’d taken Malia out and they’d gotten ice cream, but she hadn’t gotten close enough to do anything but scent them. She’d watched them for a few hours, maybe making sure they were being appropriately touristy enough, but clearly her job hadn’t been to do more than that. 

Before that, there had only been one time that Isaac had been seriously worried about getting into a fight. He’d been followed by two werewolves on his way home from university. At first they’d just been shadowing him, then they started whispering, and then shouting at him while he had studiously ignored them. He’d known enough French even then to know when he was being insulted, but he also had enough sense to pretend that he couldn’t hear them, and then when they got bored of the chase and tried to confront him, to pretend that he only spoke English. Finally, realizing they weren’t going to provoke him into a fight, they’d flashed their teeth and shoved past him before running off.

At the time, Chris’s warnings about omegas being pressured into packs were fresh in Isaac’s mind and he’d been scared they might try to confront him again, or send someone who spoke English next time, but he hadn’t seen them again. After a few days of intense paranoia, Isaac had figured that Chris might not understand the politics of supernatural Paris as well as he thought. Maybe the packs here just liked to make themselves feel big and thought lone wolves were easy targets, not worth more effort than a glare and the occasional shove on the metro. After all, what was Isaac going to do about it?

The more he’d thought about it, the more Isaac had come to suspect that the Paris wolves were little more than bullies. That, at least, Isaac knew how to deal with (he’d grown up with one, after all) and he knew the best thing to do was not to react. So Isaac didn’t start trouble. He stayed in during full moons. He especially didn’t go exploring--but that was more due to lack of time and interest rather than any kind of conscious decision.

All of which had meant that, in the end, Isaac had given the Parisian wolves very little reason to bother him. But Isaac _and_ Malia? Well, two shapeshifters pretty quickly start to look like a pack. And Paris was already set on packs. There wasn’t room for another. 

At least that was what the three werewolves that followed them out of a bistro after dinner one night snarled just before taking a lunge at Isaac, knocking him into the alley.

In some ways, Malia was Isaac’s exact opposite. Malia didn’t understand French, but she could still tell when she was being insulted, and she didn’t share Isaac’s desire to avoid confrontations. So where Isaac might’ve tried to shake the bigger wolf off and make a break for it, Malia jumped onto the other wolf’s back, wrapping her arm around his neck and choking him until he let Isaac go to take a swing at her.

Besides, once her eyes glowed blue and her teeth started to grow sharp, there was no turning back. It didn’t matter that they were outnumbered. She wasn’t going to back down once she’d committed.

In that way, they were exactly alike.

Which meant Isaac was going to be fighting right alongside her. That’s what pack did, after all.

They got their asses kicked, there was no way around it, but they’d still somehow managed to win. Or at least, Malia seemed to consider it a win. Despite the blood pouring down her face from a particularly vicious scratch that almost took her eye, she was grinning at Isaac.

“Should we chase them? Really show ’em who’s alpha?”

Isaac often forgot that Malia was even more used to being on her own than Isaac was. After all, she’d spent ten years alone as a coyote in the woods, hunting and scavenging and surviving. A year or two of high school was never going to be enough to erase that part of her.

High on adrenaline and vicious pride, Isaac felt himself answering Malia’s smile, but the fraction of sense at the back of his mind made his hand reach out and clasp her wrist to make sure she wouldn’t follow the other wolves. Holding your own in a fight was one thing; seeking it out when you were already injured was another. There was blood everywhere, and the wolves had seen Malia’s blue eyes. They needed to get home and cleaned up as soon as possible.

“Nah,” Isaac said casually before spitting out a mouthful of blood. “Maybe next time.” 

Malia pouted, but she laced her fingers through Isaac’s. The blood on both their hands made the contact sticky, but Isaac didn’t let go until they got back to the apartment. Malia was still giddy when Isaac dragged her into the bathroom for a shower. 

“You’re going to have to teach me that one move,” Malia said, tearing off her shirt rather than attempting to tug the tattered mess over her head. “When you almost kneecapped that big guy? That was awesome! I wanna be able to do that next time.”

“I’m kinda hoping there won’t be a next time,” said Isaac. This was the most animated he thought he’d ever seen Malia. Her heart rate still hadn’t gone down much. She was still ready for another fight. One of Isaac’s socks was soaked through with blood.

“What? They started it!”

Isaac could feel her eyes on him, but he just focused on peeling off his sock. He tried not to think about the bloody footprints that he’d have to clean up later. He hoped they hadn’t left any out in the hall or leading into the building. He’d have to check after this. He didn’t even know if any of their neighbors had seen them come in. He _really_ hoped not. It was late. There was a chance.

“Isaac, has this happened before?” Malia demanded. She put her hands on his neck to get him to look at her. He did. She was beautiful. She was beautiful and bloody and fierce. “ _Isaac._ ”

“No,” he answered, his pulse steady with honesty. But because he couldn’t hold back the full truth, he added, “but they’ve thought about it.”

“Isaac,” Malia whined. “You should’ve told me.”

So he did. He told her about that day on the Seine and the bullies and what every dirty look in cafés and patisseries had meant and after he was done, Malia simply smiled.

“We’ve dealt with worse,” she said.

Isaac kissed her, tasting copper, and finished stripping them out of their ruined clothes.

They’d have to burn them. 

Malia helped Isaac into the shower--cracked ribs always took so long to heal--and turned on the water. Isaac’s adrenaline was waning, slowly being replaced by something icy that made him turn up the water temperature. The water ran rusty, the shampoo lather in Malia’s hair was pink. Isaac wasn’t squeamish and he’d definitely done his fair share of violence during his time as a werewolf, but… 

But he could tell now that Malia had no sense of self preservation. Inside, she was still a wild creature, seeing nothing beyond the moment. And because Isaac was so caught up in her, his wolf wanted to follow. They could’ve been arrested tonight. They could’ve been killed. Isaac had once thought of himself as reckless, but he had nothing on this force of nature who demanded kisses from him even as he was scrubbing dried blood from beneath his fingernails. 

They weren’t a pack. No matter how much stronger they made each other, they were still just omegas. Still just lone wolves together.

They’d gotten lucky tonight. They might not be so lucky next time. But Isaac knew he would never be able to make her see reason when part of him wanted to abandon reason, too.

While Malia was still luxuriating in the hot water, Isaac stepped out and went to the bedroom while he towel-dried his hair. His heart was pounding with anxiety, and he needed to get it under control before Malia was done showering. Isaac hadn’t been lying when he’d told Chris that he didn’t know how to compartmentalize grief. But fear? Isaac had spent half his life trying to shut that down. Because if someone in a place of authority saw how afraid Isaac was (basically all the time) then they might suspect what his dad was doing to him, and no matter how much his dad had hurt Isaac, he’d been the only family Isaac had had left until Derek had come along and offered him a way out.

 _Deep breaths, Isaac_ , he thought to himself as he pulled back the covers and sat down, still naked, on the edge of the bed. _In through your nose, out through your mouth._ Isaac imagined that he could capture the swarm of panic in his chest into a ball and compress it, shoving it down into his stomach.

By the time Malia joined him in the bedroom a few minutes later, Isaac’s pulse had begun to ease. It picked up for another reason, though, at the hungry look in Malia’s eyes as she brazenly raked them over Isaac’s body. She actually _licked her lips_ in anticipation before she crossed the few feet to the bed and tackled Isaac onto his back, giggling and nipping playfully at his lower lip.

In spite of everything that had happened that night, or maybe even _because of it_ (a sobering thought), Isaac’s hunger rose in answer to Malia’s.

* * *

MALIA

Isaac was _fun_. The girl part of Malia had always liked him for the most part, even when she hadn’t really known him, but after fighting alongside the werewolf, Malia’s inner coyote absolutely adored him. The wolf was fierce but not bossy, didn’t try to “alpha” her or protect her. It respected her strength and backed her up. They made a dangerous team, and those douchey Paris wolves had better think twice before picking fights with them again.

Even after their shower, Malia was still high on adrenaline. Part of her felt bad seeing the cuts and bruises that marred Isaac’s smooth skin, but another part of her found the temporary battle scars incredibly sexy. Naked in their bed, Malia skimmed her palms and mouth across every small injury, the veins in her hands flickering black every now and then as she caught bits of Isaac’s lingering pain while his body finished healing. It was exhilarating.

After a particularly long, intense kiss, Malia grinned down at Isaac from where she was straddling his waist and declared, “You’re really sexy.”

The comment earned her a started laugh from Isaac. “Yeah?”

Malia rolled her eyes. “Shut up, you know you are.”

Isaac grinned this time. “Well if I know it, why’re you telling me?”

“Just felt like it,” Malia said, shrugging. “Plus sometimes it’s nice to hear things even if you already know them.”

One of Isaac’s eyebrows arced up. “Is this your way of fishing for a compliment?”

“Fishing?” Malia frowned, puzzled. _Fishing for a compliment_. Must be an _expression_. Malia was still learning those. There were a _lot_ of them.

Her confusion made Isaac laugh again. He pulled her back down on top of him and kissed her again, and she could feel his smile on his lips.

“You’re sexy, too,” he said when the kiss broke. “Obviously.” He gestured vaguely to her body with one hand, the other resting at her hip in a way that felt almost possessive, and Malia’s coyote really liked that. Let the ferocious wolf stake a claim; he’d shown his worth tonight.

“Obviously,” she agreed happily. And when Isaac rolled them over so he could pin her beneath him, Malia allowed him one little moment of temporary surrender, happy to be spoiled and petted for a few minutes while she rallied her strength for their next bout of playfighting. If the cocky wolf thought he had a chance of winning, it would be all the more fun when Malia beat him.

* * *

It was a full two hours after they started when Isaac finally surrendered and conceded that Malia had “won” at sex that night. They took another shower together before falling back into bed naked and arranging themselves in their “we protect each other” configuration.

Though Isaac had been the one pleading exhaustion, it was Malia who fell asleep almost instantly. As Isaac held her close to his chest, he couldn’t help but again marvel at the beautiful contradiction of Malia: formidably violent in combat, fiercely passionate in bed, almost innocently trusting and affectionate in other private moments. Malia was something to be treasured.

And now, because of Isaac, this beautiful miracle of a girl was in danger. Though they’d held their own tonight against the Parisian wolves, Isaac knew in his gut that it was far from over, and that if they continued on in this way, one or both of them would end up seriously hurt, or worse.

But the _rush_ of it! Isaac hadn’t let his inner wolf slip the leash in a long time, and the wolf had been overjoyed for the chance of a fight. It especially liked having Malia for a partner, having another predator by its side to fight off a group of rivals who were questioning their right to be in that territory. Paris didn’t _belong_ to those other wolves, right? Isaac and Malia were well within their rights to defend themselves. And it had felt glorious, in a way, to finally, after so long, just let go and make an opponent feel the full force of his animal’s fury.

The fact that Isaac was still thinking about how _good_ parts of that life-threatening altercation had felt was a serious warning sign. He couldn’t trust himself to be rational when he was with Malia. She made it seem perfectly logical that he should indulge his every impulse without question. That was all well and good when it meant making out in a park or having sex until late on a school night or going on spontaneous quests for junk food at all hours. But this was different. This was life-or-death, and even though Isaac sucked at being the responsible one, it was clear that Malia wasn’t going to take on that role.

Isaac lay awake for hours, agonizing about how he could fix this. He was jeopardizing Malia’s safety by allowing her to stay here, but he also didn’t have it in him to tell her to go. It was selfish, but that didn’t make it any less true. Malia had talked about eventually moving on to explore other parts of Europe, but other cities had territorial supernatural creatures, too, and Isaac couldn’t go with her to back her up if she got in another fight.

And she _would_ get in another fight. Isaac loved that Malia never backed down, but there were some battles that even the two of them couldn’t win together, let alone Malia on her own. How could he get her safely out of this mess?

Isaac briefly considered calling Malia’s adopted father, but even if Malia might listen to him if he asked her to come home, Isaac wouldn’t know where to begin in explaining the situation to him. Mr. Tate still didn’t know that Malia was a coyote or that werewolves existed. There was Chris, but Isaac was reluctant to involve him in another werewolf-related conflict, especially after everything the hunter had done for Isaac, and the fact that there were a lot of politics surrounding the Argents’ history and presence in Paris. As much as Isaac’s inner wolf insisted that he and Malia had a right to be in Paris, he wasn’t completely sure that that was true according to the rules of the supernatural world.

That left only one person. Someone who Isaac really didn’t want to call. Because once he did, everything would change. The tenuous peace and freedom he and Malia had found together in Paris would be obliterated, and everything Isaac had done to try to compartmentalize what had happened to him in Beacon Hills, everything he’d done to try to compartmentalize what he’d _felt_ in Beacon Hills and who he’d felt it for, would be undone. If he called that number, the number he hadn’t been able to make himself delete from his contacts after all this time, it would all come crashing down, and he’d be left as lost and defenseless as he’d felt when he’d left.

But there was no other option.

It was almost dawn when Isaac carefully extricated himself from Malia’s arms, pulled on some clothes, and stepped downstairs. Even though she was still sleeping soundly, he couldn’t risk Malia overhearing the phone call he was working up the courage to make. Plus, it gave Isaac a chance to see how bad a mess they’d made coming in. It wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been, but that wasn’t saying much. Luckily, there was half a jug of industrial strength bleach under the kitchen sink that Chris must’ve bought because Isaac certainly hadn’t. Still, he was grateful for it as he took a towel and mopped up spots and streaks of blood from the hall and stairway, praying none of his neighbors would catch him and start asking questions he didn’t even know how to begin to answer.

Luck was on his side again; he never saw a soul.

After, Isaac walked along the banks of the Seine, breathing the open air and listening to the city wake up. He smelled the freshly baked bread and roasting coffee and decided to pick some of each up on the way back to justify to Malia his leaving the apartment that morning. Not that she was likely to notice he was gone. She would probably sleep all day if Isaac let her. He caught the corner of his mouth turning up at the thought.

So he didn’t rush. He just walked up and down the banks and focused on the sounds of the boats going past. The sun rose higher above the city and the streets started filling with people beginning their days. And when he couldn’t put it off any longer, he pulled his phone out from his pocket. He scrolled through his contacts until he found the number. 

_This is how I protect you_ , Isaac thought, and finally dialed.

* * *

STILES

Stiles hadn’t slept with his phone’s ringer off in a long time. His life in Beacon Hills made it likely that there would be an emergency in the middle of the night, and, in spite of everything, Stiles still wanted to be the guy you called in an emergency. Even if he happened to be several thousand miles away from Beacon Hills at the moment.

So when his cell rang only a couple of hours after he’d fallen asleep, his hand shot out and answered before he’d given it any conscious thought.

“Hello?” he said groggily.

“Hey.”

Stiles’s breath caught, pulse instantly thudding. He scrambled into a sitting position, nearly dropping his phone in the process. The caller had only said one word, but it was enough for Stiles to recognize him. The shock of the familiar but wholly unexpected voice left him speechless for a moment.

“Stiles?” the caller asked when Stiles didn’t respond. Stiles had to clear his throat twice before he could speak.

“Hey,” Stiles echoed lamely, and then managed, “What’s up, dude?”

Well done, Stiles. Very casual.

It was hard to focus on the conversation (such as it was) with a dozen tumultuous thoughts rushing through his mind. How did Isaac remember his phone number? What could he possibly want? They basically hadn’t said a word to one another since Allison… And Isaac had left without saying goodbye, and that was probably because it was Stiles’s fault that half of them had almost died and some of them had, so it _really_ must be an emergency if Isaac was calling him now.

“Any chance you could get to Paris?” Isaac asked. No preamble, no explanation. But something told Stiles this wasn’t an invitation for an impromptu tour of Europe. That same something reminded him that a certain were-coyote of their mutual acquaintance was currently also in Paris.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, heart in his throat. “Is Malia okay?”

“Yeah,” said Isaac, but again failed to offer any further explanation, even when Stiles paused to give him time. “Can you come or not?”

“Uhhh, maybe.” Stiles turned on his bedside light and frantically rifled through his backpack, looking for his mostly-unused planner that nevertheless was a serviceable calendar. He started leafing through the pages. “When were you thinking?”

“Tomorrow.”

Stiles abruptly stopped turning pages and gave the planner the blank stare he would’ve given Isaac if he’d been there. “Wait, seriously? That’s super expens--”

“I’ve got money,” Isaac cut in. “Send me flight info and I’ll buy the ticket. Non-stop.”

A cold feeling began to creep into Stiles’s stomach. Not only had Isaac called him and invited him to Paris, but he’d also offered to pay. Two actions that were very unlike the Isaac Lahey that Stiles knew. Had known. Combined with the even-more-terse-than-usual syntax and even-flatter-than-usual tone, these were not good signs.

“Dude, what’s going on?” Stiles asked, but Isaac wasn’t having it.

“I’ll explain when you get here,” was all Isaac said. “Hurry.”

And then he hung up.

Stiles was motionless for a few long moments, phone still in his hand, staring blankly down at the European number in his call history. 

Had Isaac really just asked him to fly to Paris tomorrow? 

Had Stiles agreed by not objecting?

Stiles’s heart was thudding again as his conflicted feelings about Isaac rushed to the surface. Just hearing his voice had conjured up dozens of memories. Isaac sullen and quiet with a halo of curls and a black eye. Isaac in a leather jacket with a bloodthirsty smirk. Isaac cowering under the bed in a motel room. Isaac wearing that stupid scarf, bickering with Stiles, and Stiles wondering every time whether Isaac could tell that Stiles’s barbed comments were a cowardly substitute for flirting. Stiles prodding and instigating arguments just to have an excuse to interact with the most impossibly beautiful, infuriating boy he knew.

The boy who still dogged Stiles’s thoughts even over a year after he’d left.

How could Stiles face Isaac, after everything he’d felt for him back then--and apparently _still_ felt, given his reaction to Isaac’s voice on the phone? After everything the Nogitsune had used Stiles’s body to do, because Stiles had been weak and insecure and craved control? After the flirting and the fighting and all of the things neither one of them had had the guts to do or say?

He couldn’t. He couldn’t face that. Except…

Except that Isaac wouldn’t have called Stiles unless he really needed him. The thought caused a pang in Stiles’s chest: Isaac _needed_ him. Something must really be wrong in Paris. But Isaac had said Malia was okay, so it couldn’t be _that_ bad, right?

…Right?

And God, _Malia_. There were still feelings there, too. Memories, painful and wonderful. Malia hitting him in Eichen House, furious that he’d “saved” her. Malia in the shower, in the basement, in his arms. Malia curled around Stiles in bed. Malia highlighting her school books with the same colors as the strings on Stiles’s crime wall. Malia’s expression when she’d found out that Stiles hadn’t told her about who her father was. 

How could one person hold all of these conflicting feelings within himself? Why was Stiles like this, never able to let go of people in his heart even when they were no longer in his life? Was he some kind of emotional masochist? Did he want himself to be miserable as penance for the misery he’d caused other people? Was he really that fucked up? Surely he wasn’t _that_ fucked up.

He shouldn’t go. It would be a bad idea to go. It would be painful and awkward for everyone involved. He should finish up here and head back to Beacon Hills, where things were scary but comparatively less complicated.

But they needed him. 

Stiles glanced down at the planner still in his hands, then over toward the door to his room, where his bags had been sitting half packed since he’d arrived. The FBI internship was great in a lot of ways, but Stiles still hadn’t allowed himself to settle in. He’d never made friends. And he was just so _tired_ all the time. This kind of work fed on his frantic mental energy, and while that made him very good at it, without someone like Scott around to balance him out, Stiles was constantly in danger of overworking himself or getting caught in manic episodes that made him crash as soon as he had a day off.

Maybe it hadn’t been such a good idea to fly to the other end of the country on his own and work with a bunch of strangers while he was still processing severe emotional trauma. Maybe Stiles had convinced himself that this was some kind of brilliant career move, that it would magically force some kind of normalcy and maturity into his life, when in reality he’d just been running away.

To be fair, pretty much everyone he knew in Beacon Hills had tried to run away at some point or another, but Stiles was the first one who’d used a federal program as an excuse.

Stiles had kept his phone on because he was the guy people called in an emergency. It hadn’t been the caller he’d expected, and Stiles didn’t actually know what the emergency was, but that didn’t change the facts. So he got up, went to his computer, and began searching for flights to Paris.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the (slightly) late update. Lenna started a new job and Savannah's been busy, but we're trying to keep on top of this fic as best we can. Thank you for reading!
> 
> The title of chapter 5 is taken from https://takelessons.com/blog/french-quotes-z04


	6. Aux grands maux, les grands remèdes / Desperate Times Call for Desperate Measures

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Stiles is jet-lagged and Malia and Isaac both have a lot of Feelings.

ISAAC

“You didn’t have to meet me,” said Stiles, waving Isaac off when Isaac tried to pick up one of Stiles’s bags. “I don’t need great French to give someone an address.”

They were waiting for a taxi outside Charles de Gaulle. Isaac had overruled Stiles’s plan to take the Metro back to Chris’s apartment. He was trying not to let Stiles see it, but Isaac was frantic with worry over Malia. He’d already had to leave her alone a few times during the past two days, first while he was in class, and then when he had gone to work. And while it didn’t _seem_ like Malia had gotten into any trouble, and she didn’t suggest any more late-night excursions, Isaac was in no way convinced that the danger had passed. 

The sooner Isaac got Stiles home, the better. Stiles would know what to do. Stiles always knew what to do.

“I know,” Isaac said with a shrug. It was difficult, _much more_ difficult than Isaac had feared, to be around Stiles again and not react. The shock of first seeing him again by the baggage claim had been enough to make Isaac’s pulse kick up and his stomach go unpleasantly light with nervous anticipation. And then that _voice_ , and that _scent_ , and several excruciating minutes that were mostly short bursts of small talk about Stiles’s flight between awkward pauses during which Isaac very determinedly looked anywhere except at the face of the guy whose face he’d been determinedly trying not to stare at since he’d been old enough to appreciate faces in that way. Isaac had never been so relieved to see a taxi driver before.

Stiles looked like he was about to say something in response to Isaac’s terse comment, but the taxi driver popped the trunk just in time to save Isaac from the conversation. Isaac tossed Stiles’s suitcase in, shut the trunk, and climbed into the backseat with him. He gave the driver Chris’s address while Stiles glared at him in indignation, hugging his pillow to his chest. He had refused to let Isaac put it in the trunk with his bag.

“I may be a puny human,” Stiles hissed, “but I can carry my own stuff.”

“Just being chivalrous,” Isaac drawled, but really what he was thinking was that maybe a taxi hadn’t been such a good idea, because he was now trapped in a very small space with Stiles, and he was rapidly realizing that his hope that his attraction to Stiles would’ve disappeared, or at least lessened, during their time apart had been extremely naive. Instead, it felt like the opposite: Isaac’s built-up tolerance to Stiles’s presence back in Beacon Hills had vanished, leaving him defenseless.

Even after flying across an ocean, Stiles smelled amazing. His comfortable travel clothes and mussed-up hair were cute rather than sloppy, and his scowl and annoyed tone were almost soothing, in their own weird Stiles-y way. They conjured up echoes of memories that were comforting even though they were painful. Isaac hadn’t missed Beacon Hills, not really, until now.

Stiles ninja-paid the taxi driver before Isaac could pull out his wallet, and Isaac had to stifle a smile at Stiles’s self-satisfied smirk.

“No more paying for shit,” Stiles said firmly, pointedly grabbing both of his bags from the trunk, even if he had to juggle his pillow awkwardly under his arm to do it.

“Fair enough,” said Isaac, as casually as he could manage. But inside, he was staggering from the force of how completely he had not been prepared for Stiles to be here. Hell, he had never been prepared for Stiles. Stiles with his amber eyes and his deft fingers and his hypnotic lips had always been too much for Isaac to confront. The only safeguard against Stiles was to feign indifference. If Isaac gave in to the old urge to snipe back at Stiles as a way to cover up his feelings, he’d risk annoying Stiles, and right now he very much needed Stiles to be on his side.

Malia opened the apartment door before Isaac could pull out his key. It was only after seeing her face that Isaac realized just how bad of an idea it had been not to tell her about Stiles’s pending arrival. She was visible for maybe just under three seconds before she slammed the door in their faces and locked it. Isaac didn’t need werewolf hearing to tell she had stormed off to their bedroom and slammed that door, too.

“Yeah, that seems about right,” Stiles muttered as Isaac unlocked the door. He paused with his hand on the door knob. Stiles gave him an assessing look, one eyebrow raised as if waiting for an explanation he already understood.

“I didn’t tell her you were coming,” Isaac confessed, taking advantage of the additional safety of the heavy apartment door between them and Malia’s werewolf hearing.

“I’m not surprised,” said Stiles, one eyebrow still arched. “You barely told _me_ that I was coming.”

There was a heavy pause during which Isaac grasped for a way to explain the reasoning for his actions. But it was so complicated, and they were within human hearing, so he just said, “She needs you.”

Both of Stiles’s eyebrows were up now as he let out a slow whistle. “I, uh… I understand that you’re just starting out on Malia 101, dude, but one of the fastest ways to piss her off is to tell her what she needs. Trust me, I learned that one the hard way.”

Isaac squirmed inwardly under Stiles’s gaze, realizing more clearly with each passing second the extent to which he’d fucked up. But still, what choice had he had?

“Well, if she doesn’t _know_ what to do, then someone has to tell her,” he insisted.

Stiles stared at Isaac as if he were insane. “Oh my God, it’s like you’re trying to get us both killed.”

“I’m trying not to get _her_ killed,” Isaac said in a harsh whisper.

Stiles frowned at the seriousness of Isaac’s tone. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Later,” said Isaac, finally opening the door. He gestured Stiles inside and closed and locked it again behind them. To avoid having to continue the conversation just yet, he snatched up Stiles’s bags and took them into his old bedroom--which, he was only just now realizing, was probably going to cause problems after Malia left, since Isaac wouldn’t be able to sleep in either bed without remembering one of the two people he couldn’t have. _Fuck_.

Stiles scrambled after him.

“I’ve never enjoyed such hostile hospitality before,” Stiles said in a light tone as he surveyed the room. Isaac tossed Stiles’s bags carelessly on the bed, which he had made up with clean sheets that morning.

“Bathroom’s through that door if you want a shower,” said Isaac, gesturing in the appropriate direction. “It’s shared so lock it from the inside if you don’t want Malia walking in on you. The towels under the sink are clean. Other bathroom’s near the kitchen but it’s just a toilet and sink. There’s food in the fridge.”

“Thanks,” said Stiles, and Isaac tried not to overtly watch him stretching languorously and rolling his head to either side. 

“You should sleep,” Isaac said lamely, because he’d basically run out of small talk and he had no plan for what else to say after that. Sure it wasn’t even dark yet, but Isaac knew how cross-Atlantic travel could wear a person out. And Stiles was only human, after all; Malia had arrived in the middle of the afternoon and even she’d gone straight to bed. As if to punctuate Isaac’s concern, Stiles yawned.

“Yeah,” Stiles spoke through the yawn. He pushed the pillows that were already on the bed off to one side and laid his pillow down exactly in the middle of where they’d been.

Isaac decided that he’d finally finished conveying all essential host-guest information for the moment, which justified him fleeing this scene of incredible awkwardness and personal distress.

“I’m gonna go see if Malia wants to kill me.”

Stiles smiled, and Isaac determinedly did not smile back. Even after such a short time, being around Stiles was causing Isaac’s defensive shields to lock back up, like they had in Beacon Hills. Luckily, Stiles would not expect Isaac to ever give him a genuine smile. Isaac turned to leave.

“Isaac?”

The word, spoken in that voice, stopped Isaac in his tracks. But he didn’t look back. He didn’t dare. Because if he looked back, he would see Stiles standing next to his old bed, with Stiles’s pillow resting on it, and he’d imagine Stiles sleeping there, and the sheets taking on his scent, and Isaac couldn’t handle that. He couldn’t afford to imagine Stiles in his bed as if he belonged there. It was the kind of mental image that could destroy a person.

“Yeah?” was all he could manage.

“It’s good to see you.”

There weren’t any words that could match that sincere, almost shy declaration. What could Isaac say? _I regret asking you to come here_? _I regret not asking you to come sooner_? _Being in the same room with you again feels so good it hurts_? Isaac’s tone alone could betray him.

So he simply gave a stiff nod and left the room that used to be his, shutting the door behind him.

* * *

STILES

Bad idea. Very bad idea. Absolutely the Worst Idea Ever. Stiles should not be here. Stiles _could_ not be here. Stiles needed to go home. But Stiles needed to stay. Because Isaac and Malia needed Stiles. Even though no one had explained why yet.

 _It’s good to see you_. Why, of all things, had Stiles said _that_? What trite, pointless, detached words. It was a miracle he’d been able to say anything at all after that ride to the apartment. A taxi had never felt as small as when he’d sat in the back seat of it with Isaac. Stiles had tried to keep his gaze fixed on the Paris streets outside the taxi window because the sight of Isaac wearing a tie--What even was his job here?--was more attractive than Stiles would’ve expected. The way the knot of it had been loosened, and how Isaac’s hair had been a little messed up, like he’d been running his fingers through it, were downright sexy.

But looking away hadn’t solved the problem. Even with the space between them, Isaac’s warmth, his scent, sparked Stiles’s travel-fatigued body awake. Every word in that casual, sardonic tone reverberated through Stiles’s head, ricocheting down from his ears to his heart to his stomach like friggin’ pinballs. 

Stiles had hoped--like an absolute idiot--that somehow, even with the way Isaac’s voice had affected him over the phone, that the in-person chemistry might’ve dissipated during their time apart. It was, in fact, stronger than ever. Maybe Stiles was overly sensitive because he was exhausted, but it didn’t seem that way. The air between them felt… _charged_. Surely that kind of energy couldn’t be one-sided?

And Malia, even slamming the door in his face, was still sexy and adorable and magnetic, too. One split-second glimpse of her had been enough to convince Stiles that he was nowhere near over her, either. He’d missed her fierceness, that fire that melted into warm affection when they were alone together. Stiles hated, _hated_ that he’d hurt her. He’d known that he was the person she’d trusted most, the person she relied on to help her build confidence about her place in the world, and then he’d undercut her confidence by trying to protect her. Which, it seemed, was exactly what Isaac had just done.

She was going to kill both of them when she finally left her room. 

What the fuck had he been _thinking_?

He needed to sleep. He needed to eat. He needed to shower. And he couldn’t decide which one he needed the most in this moment. Leaving the room with Isaac and Malia out there right now was out of the question. Luckily, he could get to the bathroom from his room and he had snacks in his bag. Shower first, he decided, then food, then sleep.

* * *

MALIA

“Jerk!” 

Malia threw the nearest heavy object--a backup cell phone battery--at Isaac’s head. Much to her annoyance, he caught it easily. The same happened with the battery’s charger.

“I know,” said Isaac.

“You knew he was coming,” she growled. “You knew, and you didn’t tell me.”

“Yeah.”

His calmness only made Malia angrier. Seeing Stiles like that, just standing in the doorway with Isaac, without any warning, had felt like a punch to the stomach. She had so many _feelings_ and she had no idea what to do with them. She heard the shower kick on through the bathroom door. Stiles was in Paris. He was in her home. He was in her _shower_. And Isaac hadn’t told her.

“Why is he here?” she demanded. Her throat felt tight but she forced the words through it. “You didn’t say he was coming here!”

Isaac’s eyes kept darting away from hers. “I invited him.”

“You _invited_ him?”

Malia was out of heavy objects. Isaac dodged the small pillow she threw at him instead.

“Yes,” he said, rubbing at the back of his neck like he always did when he was uncomfortable. _Good_ , she thought, even though it was a mean thought. Isaac _should_ be uncomfortable about this.

“ _Why_?”

Her voice cracked on the word. Her chest was unbearably tight, skin too hot, eyes stinging. She was going to shift. No, she was going to _cry_. She was so _angry_ and she was going to _cry_.

“Because you need him,” Isaac said in a gentle voice, his eyes meeting hers again finally. But Malia didn’t want his gentleness now.

“Don’t tell me what I need!” she snapped, and she could feel her eyes burning blue for a second.

And _there_ it was. _That_ was why she was so angry. That was why she felt like crying. Isaac had made a decision without her, about a big thing that affected her, and that thing that he’d made a decision about was to surprise her with another person who had made a decision about a big thing that affected her.

“That came out wrong,” said Isaac, holding his hands up in a sign Malia had learned meant surrender. “ _We_ need him.”

“We don’t need anyone,” Malia insisted, furious tears pooling in her eyes. Through them she could barely see Isaac moving cautiously toward her, like she was some kind of wild animal that might bite her. He might not be entirely wrong about that.

“How could you do this?” she demanded. “You didn’t ask me. You didn’t even warn me!”

“I’m sorry,” he said, a few steps closer now. “You’re right. I shouldn’t’ve invited him without talking to you. But we’re in over our heads with the Paris wolves. We need Stiles to help us figure this out before--”

“No!” Malia shook her head, quick and hard. “We protect each other. You and me! We’re all we need.”

The tears spilled down her cheeks as Isaac pulled her into his arms. She cried against his shoulder as anger tumbled into a bewildering, unbearable sadness. She wanted to stay mad at Isaac, but he was the only person who made her feel better when she was angry.

“Not anymore,” Isaac murmured into her hair. And then, even softer: “I fucked up. I’m sorry.”

That just made her cry harder, and Isaac held her tighter.

She let him hold her for a few more minutes, and when her tears finally stopped coming she used the sleeve of his shirt to wipe her face and he didn’t stop her, even though it was one of his button-downs that he wore for work. She sighed and started undoing the buttons, pulling his tie off when it got in the way.

“Malia,” Isaac started, hesitant in that way he got when he was about to say something he knew she wouldn’t like. “I don’t want to have sex right now.”

She might have laughed if she wasn’t so sad.

“I don’t either,” she said, then explained: “Your shirt is dirty.”

Isaac let Malia take his shirt off and throw it in the direction of the laundry basket, leaving him in an undershirt with no sleeves, before he spoke again.

“I know things ended badly between you and Stiles,” said Isaac, “and I should’ve talked to you about it first, but I had to do _something_. What happened with those other wolves… It can’t happen again. We won’t survive it.”

“And you think Stiles will help us fight those guys?” Malia asked doubtfully. She was pretty sure Isaac hadn’t forgotten that Stiles didn’t have supernatural strength.

Isaac looked away from her again.

“Not… exactly.”

“Then what, Isaac?” Malia felt another hot spike of anger shoot through her sadness, because she knew what guilt sounded like in a person’s voice. “You want Stiles to _babysit_ me when you’re not around? Keep me out of danger? God, you’re just like everyone else!”

It was too much. Malia believed Isaac when he said that he’d brought Stiles there to help them. But since Isaac had been doing okay with the Paris werewolves on his own, that must mean that Malia was the problem. She was getting Isaac into trouble. And Isaac had turned to the one person everyone knew was good at _managing_ Malia to fix it.

“No, Malia, that’s--”

“Save it,” she interrupted him again, this time with a shove to his chest. Isaac staggered back a step and Malia shoved him again, knocking him back another, and another until he was out the door.

“Malia, please, I’m sorry but can we just talk about this? Maybe I can explain it better.”

“Why don’t you go talk to _Stiles_? You can talk to him and he can talk to you and then nobody has to talk to Malia.” She slammed the door in his face.

Then immediately felt guilty and opened the door again.

“Do you hate me?” Isaac asked, looking too much like a wounded puppy for Malia to say yes, even if she _had_ hated him, which she didn’t. She couldn’t. Just like she couldn’t hate Stiles. Even though it would be a _lot_ easier to hate them.

“No, I don’t _hate_ you.” Malia frowned. Isaac’s face was telling her that he would be very sad if she hated him. “I’m just…”

When she couldn’t find the word right away, Isaac guessed, “Angry?”

Malia made a frustrated noise because he was _still doing it_ \--still acting like he knew better than she did--and shut the door in his face again. She took a long deep breath and let it out.

“Yeah.”

* * *

STILES

Since being thrust headlong into the dark and terrifying world of the supernatural, Stiles had really only been jealous of everyone’s various superpowers a few times. Mostly it was the super healing he would’ve liked to have, since being a soft and squishy meat sack in a world where everyone had razor-sharp fangs and claws really sucked. But every now and then, Stiles found himself in situations where having enhanced hearing would’ve really come in handy.

Because then, when he heard raised voices and happened to overhear, it wouldn’t be because Stiles was a snoop. No, he just wouldn’t be able to help overhearing. And if it happened to help sate his never-ending curiosity at the same time, well then that was just a bonus.

But since he _didn’t_ have super hearing, when Stiles got out of the shower and didn’t hear shouting anymore, he had no choice but to go back to his room without knowing where he or Isaac stood with Malia. After all, he wasn’t about to interrupt. His reconciliation with Malia could wait until everyone who had the aforementioned razor-sharp fangs and claws had calmed down a bit.

He was putting on his favorite thin sweatpants to sleep in when he heard a door slam. He’d pulled on a T-shirt and was scrubbing the towel roughly over his hair to get it dry enough before lying down when he heard the same door slam a second time.

Never-ending curiosity finally won out.

Still scrubbing at his hair with the towel, Stiles eased the door to his room open just enough to peer out into the hallway. The scene was about what Stiles had expected: Isaac, standing in the hall, facing Malia’s closed door.

What he had _not_ expected was for Isaac to only be wearing an undershirt tank-top that clung to his chest muscles and showed off his arms. Which should’ve looked ridiculous paired with his work slacks and nice shoes, but to Stiles’s appreciative eye did not. Stiles didn’t miss lacrosse, or track, or any of the other sports he’d participated in because his and Scott’s parents had insisted they needed something to get them outside-but-not-up-to-mischief. But being able to covertly sneak peeks of Isaac without a shirt on every now and then had certainly been a perk.

This moment felt, strangely, like another kind of “sneak peek.” Sure, Isaac’s body looked amazing (as always), but it was more than that. Something in his face, in his eyes, as he stared at the door. Something Stiles had never seen before. Something Stiles didn’t think he was _supposed_ to see. But then Isaac turned to Stiles and his features rearranged themselves into a softer version of his customary nonchalance, and he was smirking at Stiles like Isaac had known he’d been there the whole time. More than that: like they were in on something together because it was completely normal for Stiles to be in his apartment, standing there in his pajamas in the middle of the day. It was a disconcerting thought, belonging in an apartment with Isaac. But not an unwelcome one.

Isaac gave Stiles this kind of “You know how she gets” look that expressed the werewolf’s intimate familiarity with Malia’s moods. _Malia_ belonging in an apartment with Isaac was an even more disconcerting thought, yet in this case seemed to be true. The ramifications of that kind of domestic relationship--Was it platonic? Were they _together_? If so, what _kind_ of together? Was it serious?--were too much for Stiles’s poor travel-fatigued brain to handle. 

Even more difficult to handle was the fact that Isaac was now walking directly toward Stiles, then past him, into the room. Stiles was about to ask him what was up when he saw Isaac rifling through a wardrobe near the window. Apparently Isaac didn’t share Stiles’s opinion that it was perfectly reasonable for Isaac to lounge around the house wearing a tank and slacks.

Stiles couldn’t help but sneak some more peeks as Isaac--alarmingly--stripped off his undershirt, giving Stiles a very attractive view of his back and shoulders before pulling on a T-shirt. Either Isaac had forgotten that Stiles was standing there, or he didn’t care. Which, given the old locker room situation, wasn’t actually that weird. But in the locker room Stiles wasn’t wearing his pajamas, and he wasn’t standing next to a bed.

Then Isaac took off his shoes and belt, and it was at the point when Isaac’s fingers went to the fly of his pants that Stiles emitted an embarrassing little squeak that was somewhere between alarm and excitement. He quickly covered the sound with a cough and desperately hoped that Isaac wasn’t paying enough attention to listen to how Stiles’s pulse had sped up.

The cough was enough to remind Isaac that Stiles was there. Stiles hoped Isaac hadn’t taken it as Stiles not-so-subtly expressing that he wanted Isaac to leave, because that would’ve been kind of a rude thing to do considering that Stiles was a guest. Regardless of how he took Stiles’s meaning, Isaac left his slacks on. Then he grabbed a pair of jeans from the wardrobe, gave Stiles a nod of acknowledgement, and left the room.

It was only after Isaac closed the door behind him that Stiles realized he still hadn’t gotten Isaac to tell him why he’d asked Stiles to come here. That would just have to wait until later. It would be too awkward to go back out now, even though Stiles’s mind was racing through worst-case scenarios.

Stiles hadn’t thought about Isaac or Malia while he’d showered (in a shower that they’d each regularly been naked in). He didn’t think about them while he mechanically chewed a granola bar (they probably ate meals together now). And he definitely didn’t think about them as he lay face-down on the bed trying to sleep (in sheets that one or both of them had slept in), praying in equal measure that when he woke up this would all turn out to be a dream, and that it wouldn’t.

* * *

ISAAC

Malia hadn’t accepted his apology. (Not that Isaac had thought that she would, of course.) But that didn’t matter. It didn’t matter if she hated him forever--which she’d assured him that she didn’t, even as she’d literally pushed him out of their room and slammed the door, locking it behind him--what mattered was keeping her safe.

And maybe eventually that excuse would start wearing thin, but for now, Isaac held that thought like a shield between him and the other closed bedroom door in the apartment. After all, Stiles had come for Malia, not Isaac. And Isaac needed to remember that. Whatever Isaac still felt for Stiles wasn’t just irrelevant; it was a distraction from the problem at hand.

A distraction that had been exacerbated by Isaac unthinkingly nearly taking his pants off in front of Stiles. And since going down that mental road would not end well, Isaac busied himself for a while with homework and, once his stomach started grumbling, with cooking dinner. Not knowing what Stiles might like, Isaac just threw together a basic pasta dish that Stiles would be able to reheat easily when he got up.

Unfortunately, the trouble with easy-to-cook meals was that all too soon there was nothing left to do, and Isaac found himself in front of his and Malia’s bedroom before he had actually thought of anything to say to her. Still, letting her get hungry wasn’t likely to improve her mood.

Isaac knocked cautiously on the door.

“Malia?”

Malia’s voice didn’t answer, but there was a light sound of blunt claws clacking on the hardwood floor, and then, after a pause, the click of the door unlocking. It opened to reveal a very naked were-coyote in human form.

“Can I come in?” he asked cautiously.

Malia surveyed him. Her eyes landed on the plate in his hand. She glanced back up at him, took the plate full of pasta, and returned to a pile of blankets on their bed, not exactly inviting Isaac to join her, but leaving the door open for him. Isaac took that as a positive response and followed her in, closing the door behind him.

Isaac tried to strike a tone that was casual but not amused. Malia wouldn’t react well if it sounded like Isaac was making fun of her.

“Been shifted since you kicked me out?”

Malia shrugged as she took a voracious bite of the pasta. It would’ve been a ridiculous sight if Isaac weren’t used to this kind of behavior: a stark-naked young woman with disheveled hair sitting cross-legged in the middle of a rumpled bed, shoveling fettuccine into her mouth with all the grace of a kindergartner.

Isaac held out a glass of water to her. “Still mad at me?”

Another shrug, but Malia took the water. Isaac stood next to the bed and waited. He knew better than to get between a coyote and her meal. It was only when all of the food and water was gone and the dishes were safely set to the side that she finally spoke.

“I hate this.” Her voice was almost a growl. 

“You hate what?”

Malia’s fingers dug into the blankets, clenching fistfuls of them, then releasing.

“This… _feeling_.”

Isaac crouched down in front of the bed so he could see her face, be at her level. 

“What feeling?” he asked gently. He was pretty sure he had some idea of what was bothering her, but it was important that Malia try to articulate her emotions. He’d spent enough time with her to know that if she didn’t, they sometimes overwhelmed her.

“Like I can’t decide…” Malia made a frustrated noise, fists clenching in the blankets again. “I can’t decide if I want to tear his throat out, have sex with him, or just… just _hug_ him, or something.”

Sensing that this might turn into a longer conversation, and determinedly banishing mental images of Malia having sex with Stiles, Isaac cautiously shifted to sit next to her on the bed.

“I mean, if you pick the right order, you could do all three…”

Malia ignored Isaac’s attempt to lighten the mood, but she looked over at him. Her expression, raw and confused and hurt, made something in him ache. 

“How can I be happy to see him, but also want to never see him again?” she said miserably.

Isaac shrugged like it was normal, but inside he’d been thinking the same thing all day.

“Maybe you still care about him even though he hurt you?” Isaac offered. He wasn’t great at playing therapist, and he’d already irritated Malia once today by suggesting that he knew how she was feeling. But he could also tell that Malia’s emotions were really bothering her, and he didn’t want her to shift back into a coyote again just to deal with them.

Her reaction was unexpectedly alarmed rather than angry. “Stiles didn’t _hurt_ me,” she protested. “He would never do that!”

“I know, I know,” Isaac held his hands up to calm her, taken aback by her response. “I didn’t mean physically or intentionally or anything.”

It stung, for some reason. That unshakable trust Malia had in Stiles, even though she was upset with him. Even though they hadn’t seen each other in a while. No matter what had happened between Malia and Stiles, she still had unquestioning faith in him. Would anyone ever trust Isaac like that?

“What did you mean?” she asked, frowning.

Isaac hesitated before saying, “He made you sad.”

“Yes,” Malia admitted after a thoughtful pause. “Sometimes. But that’s over.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s healed,” said Isaac, taking the risk of carefully tucking her unruly hair back behind her ear so he could see her face better.

Malia’s eyebrows furrowed in a way that made Isaac want to smooth his thumb over the skin between them. “How do you make a feeling heal?”

“Honestly?” Isaac gave a humorless laugh. “I’m probably not the best person to ask about that.”

She seemed like she was about to ask him why, so he hastily added, “But I’ve heard people say forgiveness can help sometimes.”

 _Forgiveness_. God, the word seemed to leave a residue in Isaac’s mouth. Why would he even want Malia to forgive Stiles anyway? So she could realize she still cared about him, and that Isaac was more of a companion of convenience than an emotional attachment? That he could never measure up to Stiles?

It was impossible not to be bitter, but at the same time, Isaac cared too much about Malia to begrudge her forgiving Stiles if she wanted to. Hell, now that he knew Malia so well, now that he’d _been with_ Malia, he’d begun to understand why Stiles and Malia had been so close for a while. If Malia forgave Stiles, Isaac would lose Malia. But really, he was always going to lose Malia. She couldn’t stay here with him forever. And if she wasn’t with Isaac, she should be with Stiles. They needed each other. They could… They could protect each other.

“Forgiveness…” Malia took a deep breath and huffed it out, tucking the rest of her hair behind her other ear as she did so. It was cute. So many things Malia did seemed _cute_ to Isaac now. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t _fair_ that what was good for everyone else never seemed to be what was good for Isaac. But then, Isaac had learned at a very early age that life wasn’t fair.

When Isaac didn’t speak, Malia leaned her head against his shoulder. “That means I have to _talk_ to him, doesn’t it.”

“At some point, yeah, that would probably help.” Isaac pressed his cheek to the top of Malia’s head.

Malia made a put-upon sound and flopped down onto her back. “Fine. But not yet. I still want to hit him more than I want to hug him.”

Isaac hid an involuntary smile and lay down beside her.

“Not yet,” he agreed. They lay there in companionable silence for a few minutes.

“Isaac?”

Isaac opened his eyes. He hadn’t realized he’d closed them. “Hm?”

Malia turned onto her side and considered him intently before speaking.

“I haven’t forgiven you either,” she said, seeming to have decided that in the moment. “But I do want to hug you more than hit you. Is that okay?”

Isaac chuckled. God, he _liked_ this girl.

“Yeah, that’s fine.

And even though Isaac knew that he should start preparing himself for her to leave, he let himself have this. No matter what ended up happening between Malia and Stiles, he’d still get at least one more night of sharing a bed with her. He helped her strip off his clothes so they could sleep skin-to-skin, and she arranged their bodies in the “protect each other” configuration that was second nature now.

One more night. Then he’d do the right thing. Just not yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit late again, but it's been a Long Week. Thank you for reading! This fic (and your comments) are the bright spot in our week.
> 
> The title of chapter 6 is taken from https://takelessons.com/blog/french-quotes-z04


	7. Comme on fait son lit, on se couche / As You Make Your Bed, So You Must Lie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which human bodies are overrated and Isaac worries a lot.

STILES

It wasn’t that the bed wasn’t comfortable, because it definitely was. And the blanket on his bed wasn’t thin, exactly, but when Stiles was tired and hungry he got cold more easily. That’s all it was. He was tired and hungry and jet-lagged and sore and all he needed was a good night’s sleep and then he’d be good to help Isaac with… whatever it was that Isaac needed help with. Obviously something to do with Malia, which Stiles would have figured out even without Isaac’s cryptic-as-shit warning.

 _I’m trying not to get_ her _killed._

Stiles had heard heard them talking earlier--not what they’d been saying, just the murmur of voices from down the hall, but they’d been quiet for a while now. Stiles wondered if that meant that they’d gone to bed and if they’d resolved anything before they had.

Stiles scrubbed his face with his hands and got up to grab his hoodie from where he’d thrown it over the top of the dresser. He pulled it on over the T-shirt he’d been sleeping in, but the material was still pretty thin and the zipper pressed uncomfortably into his chest when he was lying down. 

Turning over onto his back didn’t help. Neither did punching his pillow into a more agreeable shape.

Everything seemed unreasonably sore after that flight--his knees, his back, his shoulders, even his throat. Well, the flight had been almost eight hours, so it wasn’t unreasonable. But still. He was now stretched out on a not-uncomfortable bed with a not-thin blanket and his pillow. There was no reason he should still be feeling so--

Hang on. His throat.

Stiles had assumed the soreness had been caused by the dry, recycled air in the plane, but what if he was getting sick? He had been pushing himself pretty much nonstop since he’d started his internship, so his immune system probably wasn’t thrilled about that. Leave it to his dumb, human body to give out the second he relaxed for five minutes.

“Well, crap,” he muttered to no one.

There was nothing for it. If he was getting sick, the only thing to do was what he always did: to try to medicate himself into oblivion and get through it as fast as possible. 

As quietly as he could (though the old floorboards undermined his stealth), Stiles searched all of the drawers and cupboards in the bathroom for any kind of cold or cough medicine. Finding nothing, he ventured out into the dark living area using his phone as a flashlight, thinking that maybe there was something in the kitchen or the other half-bath. It only occurred to him then that Isaac might be sleeping on the couch. After all, Isaac had come into Stiles’s room earlier to get a change of clothes, which probably meant that Isaac had given up his room so that Stiles would have some privacy. Determined not to wake up his surprisingly gracious host, Stiles tip-toed past the couch as he continued his search of every cupboard he could find. Still nothing.

He really didn’t want to wake up Isaac or Malia, but it would be stupid to stay up all night feeling shitty and risk getting sicker just because he was nervous about confronting one of them. He needed to sleep if he was going to feel like a fully-formed human being again anytime soon, and that wasn’t going to happen until he got some medicine in him. Deciding that a good night’s sleep was worth risking waking a sleeping wolf, Stiles went back to the couch.

Which was empty.

Stiles stared at the cushions for a moment while his illness-fogged brain processed the ramifications of that information. This was a two-bedroom apartment with three people sleeping in it, and no one was sleeping on the couch. Which meant…

Which meant that when Malia had stormed off to her room earlier, it had actually been _their_ room: Malia’s _and_ Isaac’s. Stiles’s pulse thudded in his chest. His ex-girlfriend was sharing a bed (at the very least) with his secret crush.

Maybe it would be better to suffer without cold medicine after all. 

Why should this bother Stiles, though? Honestly, it was absurd that Stiles hadn’t considered the idea before he’d come to Paris. After all, Isaac and Malia had been living in the same apartment for a while. They were both gorgeous, both interested in heterosexual relationships, and both horny teenagers. Why _wouldn’t_ they sleep together? 

An unbidden image formed in Stiles’s mind of that scenario: Isaac and Malia having sex. He did his best to shove it out of his thoughts, but not before it caused a thrill of excitement in him, followed almost immediately by confusion and guilt. No. Bad Stiles. You are not a part of this. It is not your business. It does not affect you. It is not a big deal.

And since it wasn’t a big deal, there was no reason not to wake them--if they were even asleep yet--to ask where they kept their NyQuil or whatever it was French people used when they felt like their brains had liquefied and were slowly pooling in their sinuses. In fact, if he was weird about asking, it would be even _more_ awkward if he was really sick in the morning and they realized that he’d needed medicine but hadn’t woken them up. Right? But five minutes later, Stiles was still pacing outside of their bedroom door, trying unsuccessfully to make himself knock.

“Stiles.”

His name in Isaac’s voice, muffled slightly by the door, but still unmistakable. Stiles stopped pacing.

“Stiles,” Isaac repeated when Stiles didn’t answer. “Open the door.”

Which was when Stiles realized the thing that--if his brain hadn’t already clearly been hampered by his impending illness--he would’ve known before even bothering to look: Isaac and Malia wouldn’t keep medicine around because they were _were-creatures_ and therefore didn’t get sick.

Since it was impossible to fool a werewolf into believing that he hadn’t been pacing outside the room, Stiles took a deep breath, let it out, and cracked the door open just wide enough for him to stick his head and shoulder through.

“What do you want?” Isaac asked, voice sleepy and hushed in a way that made something in Stiles’s stomach twinge.

“Nothing,” Stiles said reflexively. There was a streetlamp or something just outside their bedroom window. In the pale, orangey light filtering through the curtain, Stiles could see Isaac staring at him with that familiar expression that said, ‘Don’t waste my time.’ He could also see Malia’s bare shoulders peeking out from beneath the comforter, her arm thrown haphazardly over Isaac’s stomach even though she was facing the other way. Stiles swallowed hard--because of his sore throat, no other reason--and tried to look anywhere but at the bed.

“I think I caught a cold or something,” he admitted. He kept his voice low like Isaac’s even though he knew from experience that Malia could be a very deep sleeper when she felt safe. And it was clear from the sound of her slow breathing that Malia felt safe with Isaac. Stiles felt another twinge, this time in his chest.

Isaac made a sound that could’ve been a sigh or a groan and Stiles found his eyes involuntarily drawn back to the bed, just in time to see Isaac sitting up with a stretch that dislodged the blankets and Malia, leaving Stiles to stare at what was not only objectively a very nice male chest--a chest Stiles hadn’t had nearly enough time to appreciate when Isaac had been changing shirts--but also the chest of his crush who was currently in bed with his ex, and Stiles knew that he was staring, that Isaac would probably be able to hear his heart rate picking up, but Stiles really couldn’t seem to stop himself.

There was an excruciating moment where Stiles realized belatedly that Isaac had grabbed a pair of boxers from the floor and was putting them on under the blankets--it was a miracle Stiles didn’t pass out from the sudden rush of blood away from his brain caused by his proximity to a naked Isaac--before swinging his legs over the side of bed. Though Isaac had almost definitely noticed Stiles staring by now, Stiles still couldn’t quite lift his eyes from Isaac’s barely illuminated and yet still unfairly defined abs.

“Hey,” Isaac said, closing the distance between them at a rate that didn’t give Stiles time to decide if he wanted to step forward or away until the back of Isaac’s hand was pressed against Stiles’s forehead and the only thing he could think was ‘staying right here is good.’

“Low fever.” Isaac was frowning. Despite Isaac’s clinical terseness, Stiles allowed himself to think that he sounded a little concerned, which had Stiles all sorts of confused in ways that his ill-brain couldn’t unpack just then but promised to remember for later.

And then Isaac and his hand were gone, and Stiles only barely contained the whine that was bubbling up in his throat at the loss. Before Stiles could do anything else, however, Isaac had gone to the bed and was pulling one of the many, many blankets off of Malia. Then Isaac was back, turning Stiles around with a hand on his shoulder, and guiding him back to the other bedroom.

“Bed,” Isaac said firmly. His hand was warm on Stiles’s shoulder.

“But… Medicine…” Stiles’s protests sounded weak even to himself and he didn’t resist when Isaac all but shoved him back into bed and threw the extra blanket down on top of him. Stiles couldn’t help but reflect that he’d had at least one dream like this. Well, not quite like this. Isaac was usually naked and threw himself down on Stiles after pushing him onto the bed, but close enough. Boxers-only was a decent PG-13 version of that particular fantasy.

“I’ll get it,” Isaac was saying when Stiles managed to regain control of his brain. “There’s a shop like five minutes away.”

“What?” Stiles sat up. “No, dude, you really don't have to. I can go.”

Isaac quirked an eyebrow. “Can you speak French?”

When Stiles hesitated, he got another _look_ from Isaac.

“No,” he said with a sigh.

“Exactly. Stay here.”

Stiles fell back onto the bed and let his eyes shut as he listened to the soft sounds of Isaac getting dressed, then stepping out of the room. He heard water running in the kitchen, some dishes being moved around, a cupboard being opened and closed. Then a minute later Isaac was back, and Stiles found the strength to open his eyes. Isaac was wearing faded acid-washed jeans and a thick, grey peacoat that looked so soft Stiles just wanted to bury his face in it.

Isaac held out a mug that Stiles hadn’t noticed at first glance because he was preoccupied with trying not to ogle the very pretty boy holding the mug.

“Hot water with lemon and honey.” Isaac made an uncharacteristically empathetic wincing expression. “Probably won’t taste great, but my mom always made it for me when I was sick. I’ll get some tea or something while I’m out, too, if I can.”

“Really, dude, it’s fine--” Stiles tried to say, but Isaac silenced him with yet another _look_. Stiles dutifully reached out to take the mug, his fingers brushing Isaac’s during the careful exchange. Isaac didn’t let go of the mug until he was sure that Stiles had it, maybe even a bit longer than necessary, Stiles thought, but he couldn’t really be sure. Maybe Isaac just didn’t want Stiles spilling boiling hot water all over himself and the bed. Probably that.

“I’ll be right back,” said Isaac, and then he was gone again and the front door was opening and shutting, and maybe Stiles was sicker than he’d thought if he was losing track of the passage of time, because it really did feel like only a couple of minutes before Isaac was back and offering Stiles two pills on his outstretched palm. Stiles swallowed them dry, causing Isaac to blink.

“I’ve taken a lot of pills in my life,” Stiles explained with a tired shrug. “Speaking of, can you grab the bottle from my bag? Backpack. Front pocket.” He gestured vaguely toward where he’d dropped his stuff.

Stiles had (mostly) made his peace with Adderall a while ago, which made him able to speak casually about using it and even joke about it. He’d gotten used to his doctor regularly asking him if he’d been depressed or had suicidal thoughts (he always said no, because he did experience a fair amount of dark thoughts, but mostly because of monsters trying to kill him and being possessed by a demon), and being repeatedly warned about the danger of panic attacks and heart conditions, and the insomnia when he missed a dose, and the anxiety and aggression when he overdosed, and the fact that if his ADHD didn’t diminish on its own over time, he might need higher doses to control his symptoms. It was a dangerous and addictive medication, and his dad hadn’t wanted him to take it, but Stiles had been completely out of hand--“disruptive,” was the term his teachers had used--and the results were undeniable: instead of being in danger of failing all his classes, Stiles’s grades were now the highest they’d ever been. Funny how the ability not to compulsively jump from thought to thought every three seconds or fixate on something that had nothing to do with homework for hours could improve your academic performance.

Isaac nodded and retrieved Stiles’s Aderrall, opening the bottle for him before handing it over. Isaac reached to pick up a glass of water from the bedside table to give it to Stiles for his pills, but Stiles swallowed those, too, and set the bottle on the table.

Another gift from Aderrall: the ability to focus allowed you to calmly notice things, like the little half-laugh Isaac huffed out as he lowered his hand, and the compelling gracefulness of Isaac’s long, slender fingers, now half-curled at Isaac’s side and twitching as though looking for something else to do. Stiles didn’t realize he’d been staring until he looked back up at Isaac’s face, where Isaac was regarding him intently, one eyebrow raised in an unspoken question that Stiles wouldn’t have been able to answer, under any threat or for any reward.

“Thanks,” Stiles muttered quickly, then added, “Sorry,” before settling back in the bed, wondering if the assortment of pillows would be heavy enough to smother himself with or if he’d need to crush himself under the mattress to escape from the embarrassment.

“Hey, I’m the one who dragged you out here,” Isaac said dismissively. “Least I can do is make sure you don’t die in Chris’s apartment.”

“Fair enough,” said Stiles, hoping his casual tone would help disperse some of the awkwardness.

“You good?” Isaac asked.

“Huh?”

Stiles inwardly squirmed under the intensity of Isaac’s gaze, still bewildered by the incongruity of Isaac-the-terse-jerk and Isaac-the-considerate-caretaker existing in the intimidatingly gorgeous guy who was standing over him.

“Need anything else?” Isaac clarified.

 _Yes_ , Stiles thought to himself. _I need you to crawl into this bed and make out with me and let me touch you all over_.

“No,” he said instead. “No, yeah, I’m good.”

“Okay,” said Isaac. “Wake me up if you need anything.”

“Sure,” said Stiles. He didn’t need the mattress to crush him; he was already being crushed under the weight of the awkwardness itself.

“Cool.” Isaac rubbed at the back of his neck and looked away. “’Night.”

And then he was turning off the light and leaving, and the door was shut, and Stiles was alone. Feverish, shaken, exhausted, confused… Lonely. Wanting.

Screwed. He was so, _so_ screwed.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac nearly fell down onto the couch once he’d decided to sit. The room was dark except for the city lights shining in through the window. His knees were weak, heart rabbiting, hands almost shaking. He hadn’t anticipated this. He’d tried his best to prepare himself to see Stiles again, to talk to him, to be near him. But he hadn’t expected that it would be this… _bewildering_. Now that they were out of Beacon Hills, Isaac’s and Stiles roles weren’t as clear. Everything was uncertain and overwhelming, and it seemed to be getting worse with time and proximity rather than better. 

Stiles had a mild fever and a sore throat, and out of nowhere a wave of protective instinct had taken over Isaac. This tired, sick, non-confrontational guy was not the Stiles Stilinski Isaac remembered from Beacon Hills, and Isaac found that he didn’t know how to interact with Stiles if they weren’t baiting each other. 

Despite Stiles’s humanity--and the comparative physical disadvantages that came with it--Isaac had never thought of Stiles as weak. Hell, when Stiles had been possessed by the Nogitsune, he’d been intimidatingly strong. But this Stiles, lying in the bed that had once been Isaac’s, was _vulnerable_. And somehow that vulnerability disarmed Isaac far more effectively than the bickering and sniping and maybe-flirting they used to do.

It was unbearable. Isaac could handle fighting with Stiles. He could even handle Stiles hating him, if that was how things had to be between them now, because what was important was that Stiles was here to help Malia. But _this_ … First Stiles being magnetically attractive and smelling amazing, and then being pitifully ill and needing Isaac to take care of him… It made everything so much harder. 

Isaac was already going to lose Malia. He’d known that even before he’d decided to call Stiles. But bringing Stiles here had given Isaac a glimpse of something he wanted just as badly as he wanted to keep Malia. And he couldn’t have either one.

The couch was comfortable, but there was no blanket, and Isaac wasn’t stubborn enough to deny himself his last bit of time with Malia, even if it might be a little masochistic. So he took a few deep breaths, got to his feet, and went back to bed.

* * *

MALIA

Something was different. She was awake and something was not how it was supposed to be. Was Isaac hurt? She shifted her body and found a warm, familiar werewolf-but-human body resting beneath her fur. Isaac was okay. If something was wrong, it was not Isaac. She leaned her head into his hand when he scratched the spot behind her ear that made her eyes close and her tongue loll.

“’Morning.” Isaac’s arms were around her neck. He pulled her close to his body. She licked his cheek and whined. Isaac was not hurt, but something was different. Something was not how it was supposed to be. It was morning but she was not human. Isaac was holding her but he was not smiling. Something was different.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac ran his palm affectionately over coyote-Malia’s fur, again and again, in an effort to calm both of them. He could sense an uneasiness in her that would only magnify if he showed his own unease about their situation. He knew she’d shifted forms during the night because she didn’t want to feel the complicated feelings she had about Stiles. In her coyote brain, she’d probably forgotten the reason she’d shifted in the first place.

Malia gave a big doglike yawn in Isaac’s face, to which Isaac rolled his eyes and nudged her nose away from him.

“Gross.”

Malia whuffed an affronted sound and literally rolled over onto the floor. Isaac stifled a smile. Then she took the top corner of the blanket in her teeth and started tugging, and despite Isaac’s best efforts to stay snug under the blanket, it was either let go or risk tearing the fabric. When the blanket was halfway on the floor, Isaac relented and sat up. Malia dropped the blanket from her mouth and gave him the kind of smirk that only a coyote could manage.

“Okay, okay, you win. Don’t have to look so smug about it.” Isaac reached for his bathrobe and wrapped it tightly around himself. He stared down at Malia.

“You gonna stay like this all day?”

As an answer, Malia shook her whole body as if she’d just gotten wet, then bounded for the door and nosed impatiently at the knob.

“Guess so,” Isaac muttered. And though he certainly couldn’t blame her for indulging in an excuse not to confront their guest, he didn’t have that luxury. So he took a deep breath, reaching for some way to prepare for the inevitability that he’d have to talk to Stiles. Then he opened the door and went into the hall.

Before knocking, he pressed his ear to the other bedroom door and listened. The rhythm of Stiles’s breathing, even slightly labored from being sick, made it clear that he was sound asleep. A wave of relief washed over Isaac, either because he didn’t have to face Stiles yet, or because Stiles was okay. Possibly both. Isaac turned to face the coyote who had padded out of the room behind him. She whined and cocked her head to the side in an unspoken question.

“He’s got a cold or the flu or something,” Isaac told her as he headed back through their room to the bathroom to brush his teeth. Malia followed after him. “I picked him up some stuff while you were snoring and hogging all the blankets. I know you’re pissed at him, but I have work after class so you have to make sure he drinks water and takes medicine while I’m gone. Got it?”

* * *

MALIA

Malia knew that Isaac was still talking but she’d stopped listening.

Stiles was sick? She whined again and started pawing at the door between the bathroom and the other bedroom.

“Hey!” 

Malia glanced up at Isaac, who was glaring down at her with a toothbrush in his hand.

“Knock it off. He’s going to be fine as long as we let him rest.” He spit into the sink. “And if you want to see him, you’ll have to be human.”

Malia yipped, earning herself a shush from Isaac. She did _not_ want to be human right now.

“Ugh. Fine.” Isaac gave her a _look_ that even coyotes could understand but he twisted the door knob for her.

As soon as he did, Malia shoved past him and jumped up on the bed beside Stiles, trying to smell what was wrong. He made a sleepy, unhappy noise but didn’t move to push her off. Malia glanced back to the bathroom doorway at Isaac.

His face was… sad. Or something like sad. When he saw her looking back at him, he pointed at the table next to the bed. 

“Meds. Water.”

Then he went to the closet to get some of his clothes. A few minutes later, he had left.

Malia sank down on the blankets beside Stiles and whined again. She did not like this at all.

* * *

ISAAC

After what had felt like the longest day ever, Isaac was met at the front door by an anxious coyote.

“Hey,” he said to Malia, fingers sliding along her ears as he closed the door behind himself. He set down his bag and took off his coat. “What’s wrong?”

Malia whimper-whined and trotted off toward Isaac’s old bedroom. Isaac frowned. Was Malia really still so upset about Isaac bringing Stiles here that she’d stayed a coyote all day while Isaac had been gone?

Isaac arrived in the bedroom to find Stiles curled up in the middle of the bed, blankets pulled up to his ears. He had a fresh glass of water on the bedside table, so Isaac hoped that Malia had shifted back and forth at least long enough to help him. Coyote-Malia hopped up on the bed and looked down at Stiles, then up at Isaac, and back again, wordlessly demanding an explanation.

“How’s he doing?” Isaac asked Malia, not expecting an answer.

Isaac went to the side of the bed and listened carefully. Stiles’s pulse and breathing were slightly labored. Isaac sat down on the edge of the bed and pressed his wrist to Stiles’s forehead to check on his fever. It was definitely the same or higher as last night. Not unexpected if this was the flu, but still a little worrying. Perhaps unreasonably worrying to Isaac, given the circumstances. The unreasonableness of his response was made clearer when Isaac caught his own fingers moving to brush Stiles’s bangs off his sweaty forehead. Clearly, Isaac’s compulsion to care for Stiles was temporarily overriding his sense.

He snatched his hand away and cleared his throat.

“You okay, man?” Isaac asked, leashing his concern as best he could.

“Dunno,” Stiles croaked. He peeked his chin out from beneath the blankets and gave Isaac a bleary-eyed stare. “Make it go away.”

Malia whined again and pawed at the blankets. Isaac rolled his eyes at her. “If you want to be part of the conversation you have to have human vocal cords.”

A very irritated whuff preceded the unpleasant sounds of bones and muscle popping and stretching to turn a fluffy canine back into a naked girl. Since Malia generally spent more time naked than clothed, Isaac could compartmentalize his attraction to her for now and focus on their painfully human guest. More difficult to compartmentalize was the fact that Malia was so worried about Stiles that she had actually listened to Isaac telling her to shift. Malia rarely did anything anyone told her to do without at least putting up a quick fight on principle.

“Make it go away, Isaac,” Malia echoed Stiles.

“Can’t,” said Isaac. “Weak human body.”

“Say that again when I’m not sick,” Stiles threatened from his blanket pile.

His mock tough-guy tone was undermined when he immediately lapsed into a coughing fit that sent his pulse racing and made Malia visibly distressed. She ran her hand over the blankets to soothe him, but Stiles flinched away.

“He’s got a fever,” Isaac explained when Malia looked confused and hurt. “Makes his skin feel weird. Right?”

Stiles nodded and mumbled, “Sorry.”

“Shut up,” said Isaac, but he kept his tone soft. Sniping at Stiles wasn’t fun if Stiles couldn't fight back. “Soup?”

“Later,” said Stiles, his eyes drifting halfway closed as if they were too heavy to keep open.

“He’s not talking enough,” Malia said to Isaac, as if it were fully within Isaac’s power to fix the problem. “It’s weird. Stiles talks a lot.”

Stiles made a sound that seemed to be a halfhearted attempt at being affronted. 

“Give him a day,” said Isaac. “You’ll wish he was still like this.”

“Rude,” said Stiles, and pulled the blankets back up to his ears.

Isaac picked up the nearby glass of water and held it out to Malia. “Make him drink this.”

“Throat hurts,” Stiles protested. “Water’s gross.”

“Tough shit,” said Isaac.

Malia took the glass and prodded at Stiles until he sat up enough to drink. Isaac quickly grabbed a T-shirt and a pair of jeans at random and went to their bedroom to change out of his work clothes and take a few steadying breaths. When he came back, the glass sat empty on the bedside table and Malia was under the blankets with Stiles. She was keeping enough distance between them so she wouldn’t touch Stiles’s feverish skin, Isaac noticed, but she was regarding him with the kind of anxious look that spoke of deep, genuine concern. There could be no doubt that Malia still loved Stiles.

This fact was made even clearer when Malia categorically refused to leave Stiles’s bed for the entirety of the evening. Isaac heated up some canned soup around dinnertime and Malia made Stiles eat it. Isaac in turn made Malia eat a sandwich and had one himself. Every now and then Isaac brought more water or a cup of tea to the bedroom in between working on homework assignments in the living room. Or trying to, anyway. He was doing the best he could, given his persistent awareness that the girl he was currently seeing was naked in bed with her ex, for whom Isaac had a painful impulse to protect and comfort that he couldn’t act on.

Isaac was too worried to sleep, so he was still out in the living room at one o’clock when Malia called out his name.

“Isaac!”

Isaac rushed into the second bedroom, more alarmed at the idea that something might be really wrong than he would’ve liked to admit.

“What happened?”

“He’s all sweaty,” said Malia. She was leaning over Stiles, who had kicked off all of the blankets and was groggily reaching for the water.

Isaac took a deep breath and let it out as he walked over to the side of the bed and pressed his wrist to Stiles’s forehead again. It was indeed sweaty, but much cooler than it had been last time he’d checked.

“His fever broke,” Isaac said to Malia.

“What does that mean?” She looked from Stiles to Isaac and back again, apparently not convinced she shouldn’t worry. Her eyebrows were drawn together in concern.

“Means he’s getting better,” Isaac explained. Those were the only details that would be relevant to Malia.

“Gross,” said Stiles after a long gulp of water. “Everything’s _wet_.”

His voice was still a little scratchy, but he sounded much more alert than before, despite the lateness of the hour.

“If you want a shower I’ll change the sheets,” Isaac offered. 

“That sounds friggin’ amazing,” said Stiles. He stumbled slightly as he dragged himself out of the bed and got to his feet, but he recovered before Isaac could succumb to the instinct to steady him. “Thanks, dude.”

Isaac shrugged off the gratitude and determinedly went to find the spare sheets as soon as he saw Stiles begin to strip off his sweaty shirt. Isaac half expected Malia to climb in the shower with Stiles (because she wouldn’t think something like that was inappropriate), but she helped Isaac with the sheets instead.

“Are flus always like that?” she asked Isaac.

“That was a quick one,” said Isaac. “Sometimes they’re a lot worse.”

“How much worse?” asked the were-coyote who had probably never been sick in her life.

Isaac shrugged. “People die from them sometimes.”

Malia dropped the pillow she had been stuffing back into a case, horrified. “People _die_? You didn’t say he could _die_!”

“He wasn’t going to die,” Isaac reassured her, but the fear in her voice made his chest ache--a feeling that intensified when she crossed to Isaac and threw her arms around his neck, demanding comfort in that way she had of doing, without shame or restraint. Isaac’s hands found the smooth skin of her back as he closed his arms around her and squeezed. Just because her fear had been unfounded didn’t mean it wasn’t real.

It was at that point that Stiles returned to the bedroom wearing only a towel around his waist.

* * *

STILES

Time seemed to stutter in the moment Stiles’s eyes met Isaac’s--Stiles with damp hair wearing nothing but a towel, Isaac fully clothed but holding a naked Malia tightly in his arms. Stiles could feel the heat rise in his cheeks in a way that had nothing to do with a fever or steaming water, and thought he caught a glimpse of pink near Isaac’s cheekbones before Isaac let go of Malia and stepped out of the room without saying anything.

Careful not to let the towel slip (despite the fact that his ex was shamelessly naked), Stiles quickly rifled through his bag and found some boxers and a loose T-shirt to sleep in. He pulled them on and crawled back into the freshly-made bed, noting with a slight pang of disappointment that the sheets didn’t smell as much like Isaac or Malia anymore.

“Don’t get sick again,” Malia ordered, arms crossed over her chest.

“I didn’t exactly do this for fun,” said Stiles, stifling a smile. He’d missed Malia much more than he’d realized.

“Isaac said people _die_ from the flu,” she insisted, expression still serious.

“Malia,” Stiles said patiently, “I’ve been attacked by a kanima, tortured by a sadistic hunter, threatened by various werewolves on a pretty consistent basis, and possessed by a homicidal chaos demon. I’m not about to die from the friggin’ _flu_.”

Malia made an irritated sound, but she came to the other side of the bed and lifted the blankets.

“What’re you doing?” Stiles asked, surprised and slightly alarmed.

“Sleeping here,” she said matter-of-factly. “You might get sick again.”

“I’m not going to--”

But she had slipped under the covers and was now mere inches away from him. Her proximity cut off the rest of his sentence. Now that he wasn’t in a fugue state, he was much more aware of her nakedness.

“Can I touch you now?” she asked.

Stiles’s brain froze for a split second. “Wha-huh?”

“Isaac said I shouldn’t touch you because the fever made your skin feel weird. The fever’s gone, right?”

“I, uh.” Stiles cleared his throat a couple of times. “Yeah, it’s gone.”

Malia seemed to take this as permission to touch him, because Stiles suddenly found himself lying on his back with a naked girl half draped over his chest, with only his T-shirt and boxers separating their skin. Her warmth and softness was comforting to the point where it almost hurt.

“No more big spoon?” Stiles asked, then yawned widely. Now that his fever was gone and he was clean and dry, his fitful sleep and jet-lag were catching up with him.

“We protect each other,” said Malia, as if that explained everything. And even though Stiles didn’t understand, he was too tired to ask for clarification. His eyes slipped closed.

* * *

ISAAC

 _We protect each other_.

Isaac had been almost certain from the moment he’d left the other bedroom that Malia wouldn’t be coming back to bed with him, and he’d tried to resign himself to that. But overhearing the conversation between Stiles and Malia had still been painful.

Incredibly painful.

Devastatingly painful.

Isaac was sure he wasn’t the jealous type. Jealousy made everyone unhappy for no good reason. But this was different. Hearing Malia take something that was _theirs_ , that was so central to who Isaac and Malia were together, and give it so easily to Stiles--without Isaac--hurt like a punch to the stomach.

Knowing they were on the other side of that door together and he’d be sleeping alone made Isaac ache in a way he hadn’t been even remotely prepared to deal with. Because Isaac had done this. He’d _brought_ Stiles here knowing what would happen. He couldn’t be upset about losing Malia when it meant she would have a chance to be okay.

That didn’t mean he had to be happy about it.

But it would be pointless to keep thinking about how he did or didn’t feel, because it wouldn’t change anything. So Isaac focused on researching sources for the paper he was writing and reading until he could barely keep his eyes open. He had finals coming up soon, so he had to push himself, right? Despite his exhaustion, a small part of Isaac wondered why he was even bothering to come up with an excuse for his unhealthy behavior. More old habits, that same small part reminded him. They really did die hard.

The fact was, as Isaac knew very well, that he was putting off going to his--their-- _Malia’s_ bed. He should be able to admit it to himself at least, even if he was determined to still be able to lie to the people around him if he needed to.

Isaac was seriously considering making some coffee and pulling an all-nighter to avoid the issue entirely--In for a penny, in for a pound, right?--when he heard the sharp trill of a dog whistle. He probably wouldn’t have thought anything of it, probably someone looking for a lost dog maybe, but then he heard another whistle from farther off. And then another. And another.

Cold dread started to pool in his stomach.

No one just randomly blew dog whistles in central Paris in the middle of the night. There was a slim chance, Isaac guessed, that it could be a prank, or some kind of weird tradition. There was a slim chance it had nothing whatsoever to do with the supernatural.

But Isaac lived in a supernatural world, and he knew better. A whistle sounded again, close enough to make him wince, and he _knew_ : The werewolf pack had found them. They were sending them a message. _Get out. Run. Run so we can chase you down. Or stay and we’ll flush you out._

Isaac pushed himself up from the coffee table where he’d been working and moved towards the kitchen. He didn’t bother turning on the light, especially because he didn’t want to risk drawing attention to their apartment, and crept towards the window.

Since nobody had closed the curtains earlier, it was easy enough for Isaac to lean against the wall and peer out without worrying too much about being seen.

At first, Isaac only saw the darkened street below. He watched for signs of a car or maybe someone stumbling home, drunk from a night at the bar, but there was no one. He still couldn’t relax, couldn’t shake the feeling that whatever was going on had to do with Isaac and Malia.

Five minutes later, Isaac was still hearing whistles, but had yet to see anyone. This was the kind of shit he hated in horror movies, the waiting before the jump scare. He kept feeling like someone was going to sneak up on him out of the shadows and grab him--which, to be fair, was not an invalid fear considering the whole Nogitsune saga and those shadow ninjas who’d gone around testing everyone.

When Isaac did finally see someone, it was almost anticlimactic. They came around the corner across the street, stopping beside the street sign to look around. Isaac knew that whoever it was couldn’t see him from four stories below, but Isaac still pressed back away from the window as far as he could while still keeping them in sight. They weren’t doing anything inherently suspicious, just looking around. Until they raised something to their mouth and Isaac heard the unmistakably shrill cry of a dog whistle, and his heart stopped in his chest.

They had to know. They _had_ to. Isaac wondered if he and Malia been followed or if someone had caught the scent of their blood or maybe the bleach he’d used to clean it up. Stupid. Stupid. _Stupid_. They shouldn’t have come back to the apartment the night of the fight. They should’ve run when they’d had the chance.

The longer the figure on the corner stood there, the surer Isaac was that they’d been found, that it was only a matter of time before more of the pack showed up and stormed the building.

But then they pulled something from their pocket--a phone, judging by the flash of light--and turned away, slowly making their way down the block.

Isaac felt himself take a stuttering breath. He’d been so sure they were about to be caught. But the other whistles didn’t stop and no other wolves appeared. It seemed impossible, but the only explanation was that they might suspect he and Malia lived around here, but they didn’t know exactly where. The figure was still carefully watching windows as they blew the whistle again and again, but didn’t seem to look at Isaac’s building more than any other, and soon, they were turning around the far corner.

Isaac didn’t dare relax, still expecting them to come back any second. He listened as more whistles cut through the night. But the silence between each whistle was getting longer. Several of them might have been further away than they were at first, but there were still too many that sounded like they were coming from right outside. Isaac tried to count the whistles, tried to discern some pattern, but it was too chaotic. If he listened harder, he could hear the cacophony of dogs barking in pretty much every building. Lights were turning on and off all over the place as people tried to calm down their distressed and distracted pets. At least that made Isaac feel better when he tiptoed back to the living room to turn off the light before returning to his post by the kitchen window.

He was going to need that coffee after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you for reading! This fic (and your comments) are the bright spot in our week/month/life. We'll do our best to keep posting these on Fridays (Saturday at the latest).


	8. Qui n’avance pas, recule / Who Does Not Move Forward, Recedes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which metaphorical cards are laid on the table, and Malia doesn't understand.

STILES

Waking up in Malia’s arms felt more familiar than Stiles could properly articulate at--he fumbled for where he’d left his phone on the nightstand to check the clock--five freaking o’clock in the morning. No wonder it was still dark out. Apparently between the jet lag and the mild flu, his body had completely given up on maintaining any sense of time.

He definitely felt better than he had the previous day. That wasn’t saying much, of course, but he was actually sort of hungry, so he figured that was a good sign, at least. Probably thanks to the medicine Isaac had been making him take, which would probably be wearing off soon, and all the sleep he’d gotten, which was more than he’d gotten all at once in who knew how long. Not to mention that he’d forgotten--or made himself forget--how well he’d always slept knowing Malia was there. For all his griping about it, being a were-coyote’s little spoon was pretty damned cozy.

Knowing that he’d only have a little while before he started to feel like shit again, Stiles forced himself to get up, even though what he really wanted to do was snuggle back down into Malia’s arms and stay there as long as possible. 

Stiles snuck out of the room and tiptoed towards the kitchen without turning on any lights. Malia might not have stirred, but Stiles really didn’t want to bother Isaac again if he didn’t have to. They’d been getting along almost unnervingly well so far, all things considered--Maybe Isaac thought it was unsporting to pick fights with a sick human--but Stiles didn’t want to push it. He was a guest, after all. A suddenly-and-mysteriously-coerced-into-visiting guest, but still. Best not to annoy his more-or-less-gracious host more than was necessary.

Which was why Stiles nearly jumped out of his skin when he turned into the kitchen and found said host leaning against the wall beside the window, face just barely illuminated by the light from a streetlamp several storeys down. So barely, in fact, that if it weren’t for the two telltale rings of glowing gold, Stiles might have missed Isaac entirely.

“Jesus, Isaac!” Stiles clutched at his chest, trying to slow his now-frantic heartbeat. “What the fuck--”

Isaac had crossed the room and was covering Stiles’s mouth with his hand before Stiles could finish asking him what he was doing. Stiles found himself being pulled back away from the window and out into the living room.

And it wasn’t that Stiles didn’t appreciate being manhandled by Isaac, because he absolutely did. It was just that a glowy-eyed boy reenacting a noir scene before dawn kind of tipped Stiles off to the fact that this might just have something to do with why Stiles had been brought to France.

So as much as he ordinarily would’ve been happy to bask in sexy boy smell for a minute or so, he shook Isaac off and went back into the kitchen.

“Stiles,” Isaac hissed from behind him.

Stiles waved a placating hand back at him, but kept close to the counters, out of direct line of sight of the window.

Not having supernatural vision, Stiles had to squint a bit and let his eyes adjust before he could see what Isaac had been looking at, but he found it eventually. There were two figures standing on the street corner below the apartment. The street was empty, otherwise. Stiles couldn’t tell which way they were looking in the dark.

“Do you see them?” Isaac breathed against Stiles’s ear. Stiles hadn’t even noticed Isaac approaching from behind him, but now he couldn’t ignore the heat of Isaac along his back.

Stiles tensed to fight the sudden urge to lean his flu-sore muscles into the warmth of Isaac’s body, and desperately prayed that Isaac would think that his pounding heart was because of anything besides their proximity, because he didn’t have it in him right now to try to explain it away.

Stiles cleared his throat and nodded. His ear slid against Isaac’s cheek. It was smooth and warm.

“They’re part of a werewolf pack Malia and I had a run-in with last week,” Isaac murmured.

“What?” Stiles barely remembered to keep his voice down. He nearly crashed his nose into Isaac’s jaw as he suddenly turned to look at him, but Isaac’s werewolf reflexes caused him to lean back just in time. “ _Isaac_.”

Isaac held up a placating hand. “I know, okay, so save the lecture.”

Stiles opened his mouth to protest, but Isaac talked over him: “I don’t think they know where we are. They’ve been canvassing all night, though.”

If Isaac had intended for that comment to somehow make Stiles less worried, he had seriously miscalculated.

“Meaning it’s only a matter of time until they find you.” Stiles didn’t phrase it as a question, but he took Isaac’s silence as confirmation anyway.

“Great.” Stiles tapped his forehead against the wall. “Great. That’s freaking _great_. When, exactly, were you planning on telling me about this?”

“I would’ve told you sooner if you hadn’t brought a flu with you across six time zones.”

The familiar affected antagonism in Isaac’s tone had Stiles rolling his eyes. “Sure, because you seemed _so_ eager to bring it up before that.”

Motion from the street below had them both shushing the other before Isaac had a chance to respond. A flash of gold at the corner of his eye, and Stiles found himself unintentionally holding his breath as the figures started walking away. He didn’t release it until they were out of sight.

“Do you think they’re gone?” Stiles whispered.

Isaac was so close, Stiles could feel his shoulder lift in a half-shrug. “I don’t know. Haven’t heard dog whistles for a while.”

Stiles gave Isaac a level stare. “Dog whistles.”

“They’re not going to come off as much of a threat if they don’t get our attention,” Isaac said casually, as if rival werewolves using dog whistles to intimidate each other was an everyday occurrence.

Clever, though. Stiles had been wondering how Isaac had figured out that the people on the street had been there to threaten him and Malia.

“Looks like they’re gone. It’s probably safe to turn on the light now,” said Isaac as he moved towards the switch. “Watch your eyes.”

Stiles wanted to ask how he was supposed to watch his own eyes, but still squeezed them shut in preparation for the sudden brightness.

When Stiles opened his eyes a few seconds later, Isaac had already started preparing a pot of coffee. Or rather, another one, given the fact that Isaac had to remove used grounds to do it. Stiles wondered idly what effect, if any, caffeine had on werewolf metabolism. Surely if alcohol didn’t do much, then caffeine wouldn’t, either.

“All right, Lahey, spill,” Stiles said firmly, because this had gone on long enough. “You didn’t pay over a grand out of your pocket and risk Malia’s wrath to rush me out here over some dog whistles and a ‘run-in’ with a couple of other wolves. Tell me everything, and don’t spare me the probably-literally gory details. I can’t help if you hold back.”

* * *

ISAAC

So Isaac told him.

“We got into a fight.” Isaac tried to stick to the facts. Even though he didn’t want Stiles to worry, Isaac needed him to understand why Malia couldn’t stay. So he told Stiles about how injured they had been, how strong the few members of the pack that had jumped them were. How he didn’t know how many there would be next time. For something that had been weighing so heavily on Isaac, it took surprisingly little time to explain.

Isaac was glad Chris had taught him how to compartmentalize. It helped him leave the past where it belonged and explain their situation without reliving it like he once might have. Maybe it wasn’t always healthy, but sometimes it was necessary. 

_“Stay clinical_ ,” Chris Argent had taught him, “ _don’t let emotion get involved_.”

While Isaac spoke, Stiles sat at the kitchen bar watching him intently. Isaac leaned back against the counter between the fridge and oven with his arms crossed in front of him, watching Stiles right back. Stiles asked a few questions, mostly requests for clarification about French words Isaac used without thinking, but otherwise he listened quietly right until the end of Isaac’s explanation:

“They saw Malia’s eyes.”

“Shit.” Stiles dropped his head onto the bar’s counter with a thunk.

Isaac couldn’t think of anything else to add to that, so he simply stared down at the cooling mug of coffee in front of him. _Shit_ just about summed it up.

“What the fuck are you still doing here, Isaac?” Stiles asked, forehead now pressed to the countertop. Isaac wondered if he needed more medicine. “You sure as shit didn’t need me to fly all the way over here to tell you that you’re both in serious friggin’ danger.”

“No,” said Isaac, determinedly keeping his tone calm, “but you’re the only person who might be able to convince her to leave. And you couldn’t do that from thousands of miles away.”

“You’re telling me she refused to leave with you?” Stiles turned his head to the side so that he could squint up at Isaac with his cheek still resting on the countertop. 

Isaac took too long to come up with anything to say to that, because he didn’t think, _She might’ve, if I’d asked her_ , was going to be a good enough answer for Stiles.

It didn’t matter. After the silence stretched on for a few seconds, Stiles seemed to work it out well enough on his own.

“Are you _kidding_ me?” Stiles asked, lifting his head up entirely to glare at Isaac. “You want to stay here?”

“I have a life here.” Isaac reached for his mug to have an excuse not to meet Stiles’s eyes. “I’ve got classes. I help out at an after-school program. I can’t just pick up and leave.”

“Okay, putting a pin in the fact that you’ve just revealed that someone lets you take care of children,” said Stiles, “ _yes_ , you actually _can_ pick up and leave. When your life is threatened by a bunch of beret-wearing, cigarette-smoking, espresso-drinking Francophone werewolves, you should pack your friggin’ bags and move away!”

“Not an option,” Isaac said firmly.

Stiles heaved an exasperated sigh. “So, what, I’m supposed to just pull Malia onto a plane and we’ll leave you here like you don’t have a literal pack of wolves sniffing around outside your window?”

“Well, you could always take a boat.”

“Isaac!” Stiles slapped his hands on the countertop for emphasis. Luckily the surface absorbed most of the sound. “Would you fucking stop deflecting for one second and be honest with me? This is literally life and death!”

“This is as honest as it gets, Stilinski.” Isaac took a sip of his coffee to emphasize that this wasn’t up for debate. “I can’t leave and Malia can’t stay. I’ll be fine, she won’t. Are you going to help me protect her or not?”

Stiles pressed the heels of his hands against his face and groaned. Isaac made a note to pick up more decongestant on the way home later.

“Dude, you can’t have it both ways here,” Stiles insisted, dropping his hands, his tone an equal mix of serious and stubborn. “You’re saying it’s not that big a deal and you’ll be fine on your own after we leave, but you rushed me out here to help you protect Malia, who, let’s be honest, is probably a better fighter than you. You’re acting like the other wolves are magically going to not see you as a threat anymore, but you stayed up half the night watching the windows like we’re living in a Hitchcock movie and you need to keep us safe. Isaac, this is fucking _nuts_ , and you know it.”

There was no mistaking the concern in Stiles’s voice. It did things to Isaac’s insides that felt painful and wonderful at the same time. Stiles _cared_. He didn’t want Isaac to get hurt. The thought was simultaneously touching and annoying. Did Stiles really think Isaac couldn’t handle himself? Isaac wasn’t lying when he’d said that he’d managed to stay safe until Malia had shown up. Maybe things had escalated to the point where they’d be a bit dicier for Isaac now, but, even though he’d never blame her for it, Malia _was_ the reason they were all in danger. An unassuming lone beta who the local packs could bully every now and then wasn’t a threat, but a bloodthirsty, blue-eyed coyote teaming up with him and kicking their asses? That was an insult that wouldn’t be ignored.

“I was handling it before she showed up,” said Isaac, determined to keep his voice steady. “I can handle it when she’s gone.”

“Can you, though?” Stiles asked. The stubbornness was fading and the seriousness intensifying.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means I know what it feels like to lose her, and I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. Which, incidentally, means I wouldn’t wish it on you. Have you thought about that part of this? What it’s going to do to both of you?”

If Isaac had been brave enough to admit the truth, he would’ve said, _That’s basically almost all I think about_. But what he said instead was, “Yeah, well, she’s got you now.”

* * *

STILES

 _She’s got you now_.

There hadn’t been any bitterness in Isaac’s voice, but it still hit Stiles like a punch to the gut. Was Isaac really going to push Malia back at Stiles, just like that? Stiles had seen Malia and Isaac together. He _knew_ that whatever was between the two of them was real. How could Isaac be willing to give that up without a fight? How could Isaac bear to see Malia casually crawling into bed naked with Stiles and sleeping there with him, leaving Isaac alone, and not be angry with Stiles?

And yet there Isaac was, casually sipping coffee, like all of this was perfectly normal and that there was nothing to be bothered about. Which meant that Stiles could leave it at that, if he wanted to. He could follow Isaac’s lead and pretend all of their behavior since Stiles had arrived was completely logical and nothing to cause any awkwardness or guilt.

But though Stiles had often laughed things off because that made it easier to grapple with awkwardness, this wasn’t something that could be dismissed. This was Malia, and Isaac, and everyone’s collective happiness and physical safety. So without further preamble, before he could chicken out, Stiles bit the bullet:

“I’m sorry.”

Isaac looked up from his mug of coffee. “For what?” Because they both knew Stiles wasn’t sorry about pushing back against Isaac on his decision to stay in Paris. That part of this conversation was definitely not over.

“The way I’ve been with Malia. Obviously the letting-her-sleep-naked-in-bed-with-me thing definitely wasn’t cool, but even smaller stuff. I know she still has some of my clothes. She doesn’t act like I’m just her friend. And it’s shitty of me not to point it out to her, especially…” Stiles shrugged awkwardly. “It’s just, I mean, you know her. She doesn’t get the whole ‘ex’ thing.”

There was an intense pause during which Stiles held his breath. Isaac’s expression was unsettlingly unreadable, voice calm when he said, “You think that bothers me?”

“Uhh… I dunno.” Stiles blinked at Isaac, wondering if he’d heard him correctly. “I thought maybe you’d be mad or something?”

Isaac cocked his head to the side, calmly regarding Stiles in a way that unnerved him. “Why would I be mad?”

Stiles grasped for something to say in the face of this illogical response. “Isn’t she, like… your girl… friend?”

Isaac took another sip of his coffee before responding, “Malia doesn’t think like that.”

“I know,” said Stiles. Then, after a pause, “Do _you_ think like that?”

Isaac shrugged as he got up, tipped his head back, and took a long swallow before putting the empty coffee cup in the sink. 

“Malia can do what she wants with who she wants.”

Stiles searched for a sign of jealousy in Isaac’s tone or expression, but didn’t find one. They might as well have been talking about what to eat for lunch, for all of the emotional investment Isaac seemed to have in the conversation. Stiles was so thrown by this turn of events that he found himself leaning against the kitchen counter for support. Was he really understanding Isaac correctly here? He had to be sure.

“So the way we’ve been… close, since I got here.” Stiles watched Isaac’s expression warily. “You’re cool with that?”

There was still nothing jealous or hurt about the look that Isaac pinned him with. Instead, what Stiles found there made his breath catch and stomach drop like he’d just hit the first drop in the roller coaster he’d been riding since he’d met Isaac. Stiles didn’t have time to decide if he liked the feeling or not before Isaac was pivoting toward the part of the counter where Stiles was leaning. 

“Why do you care?” When Stiles didn’t answer the question, Isaac continued, “What do you want, Stiles?”

Isaac’s voice was unexpectedly low and deep, and suddenly the kitchen felt very small. One of Isaac’s hands braced on the edge of the counter next to Stiles’s arm. Then the other came to rest on Stiles’s other side, loosely caging Stiles in. Alarm bells sounded in Stiles’s head at the proximity. Was Isaac fucking with him? Had he noticed how Stiles had reacted when Isaac had gotten close to him, near the window? It wouldn’t be the first time Isaac had tried to get a rise out of Stiles when he could tell Stiles was nervous.

“I-I…” Stiles’s voice cracked as his mind frantically searched for a reasonable response to Isaac’s impossible question. Isaac wasn’t that much taller than Stiles, but Stiles felt very small trapped so close to him. Isaac smelled so good, felt so warm even though he wasn’t actually touching Stiles.

“You…?” Isaac prompted. Calmly but firmly, like he wouldn’t let Stiles go until he got an answer to the question that was short-circuiting his brain.

Stiles couldn’t help his reaction. He’d always had a thing for intimidatingly confident people with hidden depths. He’d never been able to make things easy for himself by just falling for the sweet girl (or boy) next door. No, Stiles liked a challenge. He was attracted to people with claws, whether they be figurative or literal. It wasn’t as simple as wanting a “bad boy” or a “bad girl,” thinking he could be the one to change them. He didn’t want to change them. He just wanted to play with the badness, see if he could reach what lay beneath it, whether it be dazzling intelligence (Lydia), vulnerability and tenderness (Malia), or a spark of goodness that persisted under unthinkable pain (Isaac).

It was an unhealthy, self-destructive impulse. Hell, it was probably why the Nogitsune had been able to enter Stiles’s psyche without his knowledge. But the fact remained that Stiles could never be satisfied with a partner who didn’t keep him guessing, even if that unpredictability caused him pain. And he now found himself in the most unpredictable situation he’d ever encountered, with two people who had literal claws and sharp teeth, both of whom had the power to emotionally devastate him with a look.

Like a moth to a flame. He was helpless.

“It’s a simple question,” said Isaac. His voice was quiet, so quiet, but it was the only thing Stiles could hear. He carefully avoided Isaac’s eyes.

A simple question? If Stiles could’ve moved at all, he would’ve gaped at Isaac. _What do you want, Stiles?_ Stiles had asked Isaac if he was okay with Stiles sleeping naked in a bed with a girl Isaac was sleeping with, and instead of a yes or no, _Why do you care? What do you want, Stiles?_ Isaac hadn’t said no. Stiles’s brain kept stuttering on that. Isaac hadn’t said he wasn’t okay with Stiles and Malia being… physically intimate. Which meant _What do you want, Stiles?_ had a host of implied meanings: _Do you want to keep sharing a bed with your ex, Stiles? Do you want to fuck the girl I’m fucking, Stiles?_ _Do you want me to care that you want her, Stiles? Do you want…?_ Stiles was bold enough, now, with Isaac pressed so close, to think it might even mean, _Do you want_ me _?_ They’d been dancing around it for so long. It wasn’t impossible. _Do you want_ me _, Stiles?_

_What do you want, Stiles? What do you want? Why do you care? What do you want?_

And Isaac called that a simple question! There were no words to answer a question like that. Well, there were, but they weren’t words Stiles could ever say: _I want that. I want all of that. I want all of that and more. I want_ everything _._

Even as his throat locked to choke his voice from speaking, another part of Stiles’s body traitorously offered an answer as images involving Malia and Isaac flooded unbidden through his brain. They would’ve been inappropriate and inconvenient (to say the least) thoughts even if Stiles had been alone, but now, with Isaac so close…

Stiles jumped at the sudden sensation of Isaac’s hips pressing into his. The action could’ve been explained away as an innocent accident, just contact occurring from Isaac shifting his weight so close to Stiles. Except that Isaac didn’t move away, and when Stiles dared to look up at Isaac’s face, he found Isaac’s eyes staring down intently at that point of contact, as if he could see through Stiles’s pants and was transfixed by what he saw.

Stiles wanted to touch Isaac so badly he was shaking. He loved Malia with a depth no one else had ever reached, and he still found her devastatingly sexy, but there was something visceral in his attraction to Isaac that was painful in its intensity. It was what made Stiles lash out at Isaac, needle him. The energy had to go somewhere, and since he’d never been able to touch or kiss Isaac like he’d wanted to, he’d found other ways to provoke him. Was that finally going to break now? Even without werewolf senses, Isaac could be in no doubt that Stiles was attracted to him. And Stiles could literally feel, thanks to their proximity, that Isaac wanted him, too. Would they finally stop dancing around the issue, stop pretending not to like each other despite all evidence to the contrary? Stiles ached to finally destroy that tension, felt his own hand lift in preparation to reach out for Isaac, but--

But it was too late. Surely it was too late now. Isaac had left Beacon Hills, and then Malia had followed, and they’d found something together without Stiles. What right did Stiles have to risk ruining that for them? It was all well and good for Isaac to say that Malia didn’t think about relationships in the conventional way, or imply that he wouldn’t be jealous if Stiles pursued something with Malia again. There were just too many ways for this to go horribly wrong. Stiles couldn’t bear the thought of ruining the lives of two people he cared about, no matter how badly he wanted to see where all of this might lead.

“You’re Malia’s,” Stiles heard himself whisper above the roar of his own blood rushing past his ears. He dropped his hand and gripped the edge of the counter to keep from reaching for Isaac again. “I can’t.”

Isaac’s mouth was alarmingly close to Stiles’s ear when he whispered, “Can’t what?”

Stiles took a shaky breath. _I can’t touch you_ , he thought. _I can’t let you be this close to me. I can’t have what I want, even now that I know you want it, too._

But the words he decided on were, “I can’t hurt her again.”

Brave, fierce, soft-hearted Malia. Stiles had lost her because he hadn’t been honest with her. He’d betrayed the trust of a girl who trusted almost no one, and he’d gotten what he’d deserved for hurting her. He couldn’t do that again, especially not now that he’d been reminded of what it felt like to hold her, to make her smile, to be the focus of her attention.

“I still love her,” Stiles confessed, because there was no point in hiding it.

“I know,” said Isaac. His tone was unsettlingly flat. Not hostile, not disappointed, just… blank. He took a step back from Stiles, breaking contact and allowing Stiles freedom to move. But Stiles remained braced against the counter. His knees felt too weak to walk, and the loss of contact had unmoored him.

“I want her to be happy,” said Stiles, trying to catch Isaac’s eyes. He needed Isaac to understand. It was very important to him that Isaac understood. He needed Isaac to know that Stiles wanted Isaac so badly it hurt, that the only thing stronger than his attraction toward Isaac was his love for Malia.

“Me, too,” said Isaac, in that infuriatingly flat tone. His eyes were equally remote.

“She’s happy with you,” Stiles insisted. Couldn’t Isaac see how important and wonderful that was? How rare?

“But she’s not safe.” A faint catch of emotion in Isaac’s voice. It made Stiles’s chest ache, because he knew that feeling: wanting to protect someone who rarely understood the concept of danger.

Stiles sighed heavily. “When I tried to protect her, I lost her.”

“If she stays here, something bad’s going to happen,” said Isaac.

“Like Beacon Hills is much better.” Stiles tried to smirk, but the joke felt too honest even for them to laugh at.

Isaac took Stiles’s failed attempt at humor as an opportunity to escape.

“I have to get ready for school.”

Stiles glanced out the window. It was still dark. Isaac followed his gaze.

“I need to go to the library before my class,” he said, though Stiles hadn’t said anything to contradict him.

It didn’t take supernatural hearing to know Isaac was lying. Isaac was trying to run, because that’s what Isaac did. Hell, the fact that they were in Paris now was evidence of that. This conversation was nowhere near over, and there was more left unresolved between them than when it had started.

Stiles took a deep breath and sighed it out. Now that the rush of sensation that had flooded through him when Isaac had pressed against him had abated, his head and muscles were aching again, reminding him that he was still a frail human.

“You’re so full of shit, Lahey,” he said as he rubbed at his temples to try to soothe the pain there. He was so tired of fighting. He wanted to go back to bed and curl up with the warm, soft girl he had hurt, until she forgave him. He wanted Isaac to skip class and join them. _What do you want, Stiles?_ He wanted them near him forever. But that was impossible.

Isaac opened his mouth, looking like he was either going to offer a retort to Stiles’s comment or make up another excuse to leave, but then he glanced toward the hallway. Door hinges had just creaked. Malia was awake.

“Take some more meds,” said Isaac. And then he left the kitchen without a backward glance.

* * *

MALIA

She heard them talking for a while before she was fully awake. She couldn’t actually hear what they were saying, but even though she was sleepy she could still recognize Stiles’s and Isaac’s voices, and since nobody sounded too angry, Malia wasn’t worried.

It would’ve been easy to tuck herself back under the covers or shift into coyote form and fall back asleep listening to them, except that Malia wasn’t sure if Stiles should be out of bed yet if he was still sick. She knew he’d been able to take a shower the night before, but that had only been a few hours ago. Isaac had said that sleep was the best thing for people when they were sick, so shouldn’t Stiles still be sleeping?

So instead of letting herself be soothed back to sleep, Malia let the voices lead her out into the living room. Except she’d barely opened the bedroom door before Stiles and Isaac went quiet.

“You’re so full of shit, Lahey.” That was Stiles. Was he talking to Isaac? He sounded so… what was the word for it? Like he was making a joke but it sounded mean. Was there a word for that? 

“Take some more meds,” said Isaac, and a second later he was coming out of the hall that led to the kitchen.

“Isaac?” Malia asked when he brushed past her. She spun around and caught his arm, because Isaac would never ignore her if everything was fine.

He let her pull him back, but she could feel how tense he was, how anxious. He wasn’t usually like that around her anymore, and she didn’t like it.

Before her awake-too-early brain could figure out what she wanted to ask him-- _What happened? Are you okay? What did Stiles do?_ \--Isaac was hugging her close, pressing a kiss to her forehead, and disappearing into his old room. A minute later, Malia heard the shower kick on.

She went to the kitchen.

“What was that about?” she asked Stiles.

“What was what about?” Stiles made his eyes big in a way that Malia had realized a long time ago was supposed to make him look innocent.

“Isaac,” she said, hoping that Stiles would understand what she meant without Malia having to actually try to figure it out. It was too early and she was too sleepy and confused by their behavior to explain it. “He doesn’t act like that.”

Stiles made a _face_ and said, “Maybe not around you he doesn’t, but that’s pretty much par for the course when it comes to how Mr. Charisma acts around me.”

Malia frowned. Stiles sounded… _irritated_. Was he irritated with Isaac? Did he not like Isaac? It had never occurred to her that Stiles and Isaac wouldn’t get along. They hadn’t been extremely friendly toward each other since Stiles had arrived, but neither of them was extremely friendly most of the time. (Since Malia wasn’t extremely friendly either, that suited her just fine.) And Isaac had taken care of Stiles while Stiles had been sick, so he clearly cared about what happened to Stiles.

But there was… something. Something in their tones of voice, in their expressions, in Isaac’s hug, that Malia didn’t understand but knew wasn’t good.

“I don’t like it when you make jokes when I ask questions,” she said, because her therapist had told her that she needed to try to be clear about her feelings if she wanted people to change how they behaved.

Stiles’s smile slipped, and he held up one of his arms to invite Malia in for a hug. She was still annoyed with Stiles for not giving her a direct answer to her question, but she also wanted to hug him. The air was cold and she was wishing she’d brought a blanket with her.

“I’m sorry,” he said softly, even though she already knew he was sorry because of his face and the way he was holding her. He kissed the top of her head, and it was almost exactly like what Isaac had done a few minutes ago.

She wanted them to get along. She didn’t know what she would do if two people she really liked didn’t like each other. She wished Isaac didn’t have to go to school so he could come back to bed with her and Stiles. She wished Isaac had come to bed with them before. Maybe he hadn’t because Isaac and Stiles really didn’t like each other. The thought made her very sad.

Stiles felt heavier than he should’ve, like he was leaning some of his weight against her. She looked up to see his eyes were half closed. When she touched the side of his head to angle his face down toward her, a little line of black jumped through her veins. Just a small headache, but still. Malia didn’t like Stiles being in pain.

“You’re going back to bed,” she said firmly.

“I am?” said Stiles. His eyes were closed now and he was leaning his heavy head into her hand.

“Yes. You’re still sick. You need sleep.”

There was a pause, and Stiles’s eyes opened and gave her a look that said he might argue, but then he sighed and said, “Fine.”

“Where’s your medicine?” Malia asked as she shoved Stiles (as gently as she could) back into his den.

Stiles made a tired gesture toward the bedside table, where a mostly-empty pack of pills was sitting next to a glass of water.

“Why’re you even up? Isaac said you’re supposed to sleep.”

“He did, huh?” Stiles let Malia push him down into the middle of the bed.

“Why were you even up anyway if you’re still tired?” she asked. A thought occurred to her suddenly that made her frown. “Did you not want me to sleep with you?”

Stiles gave Malia a look that she could only describe as _soft_. “I liked having you here with me. I was just hungry.”

Malia couldn’t tell if Stiles was lying because his pulse was all messed up from being sick, but she decided to believe him because he’d said something nice.

“Did you get food?” she asked Stiles as she started tugging blankets up onto him.

He shook his head sleepily. Stiles was very cute when he was sleepy. Malia had forgotten that.

“I’ll make you something.”

“You don’t have--”

“Too bad, I’m doing it anyway.”

“Mmkay,” said Stiles. He’d settled in under the blankets with his head on his pillow.

“Don’t sleep yet,” she ordered. “Isaac said you need to take medicine.”

Stiles opened one eye to look up at her. “Seems like Isaac’s been saying a lot of things about me lately.”

Malia didn’t understand Stiles’s tone of voice at all, but she decided it was more important to get Stiles some food than it was to figure that out, and since he had picked up two pills and swallowed them, she let it go and went back to the kitchen.

* * *

ISAAC

Fuck.

 _Fuck_.

Isaac’s mind and his pulse were both racing even after he’d escaped to the shared bathroom after rushing through the guest room to grab some clean clothes. He was relieved, _so_ relieved, that Stiles had stopped him before Isaac had taken things any further. He didn’t know what he’d been thinking. Well, he _hadn’t_ been thinking, actually. That was the problem. He’d never been able to think clearly when Stiles was around. And now Stiles was _everywhere_. His scent had filled the apartment, and the sound of his heartbeat and his little fidgety noises were always within hearing distance for Isaac’s werewolf senses. 

Isaac turned the water up as hot as it would go, trying to scrub whatever other stupid impulses he might try to follow out of his head before he had the chance to fuck anything else up.

He’d meant to _scare_ Stiles. He’d wanted to push into Stiles’s space and threaten him, make him promise to take Malia away now that he knew about the wolves literally outside their door. But that wasn’t what had happened at all.

Instead, he’d almost… Isaac didn’t even really know what he’d almost done, what he would’ve done if Stiles had let things progress. Isaac might not have been sure if Malia considered their relationship exclusive, but he did imagine she probably wouldn’t be thrilled with Isaac coming on to her ex-boyfriend, for whom she still had very complicated feelings. Even if it wasn’t cheating, _per se_ , it would still be doing yet another thing behind Malia’s back. And yet, Isaac hadn’t been able to resist. Because it was _Stiles_.

 _Fuck_.

Isaac wanted to break something. He wanted to scream--no, he wanted to _howl_. He wanted to tear apart the room like he was tearing apart his life.

But Isaac did none of those things. Isaac stood in the spray of the shower and tried to imagine the water washing away his anxiety and anger. He relaxed his shoulders and took several deep, careful breaths of the steamy air and refused to think about how stupid he was anymore.

He couldn’t let himself. He couldn’t let himself be anything like the rage-fueled man who had raised him. The man who couldn’t control himself, couldn’t keep himself from pushing his own inadequate bullshit onto his sons.

Isaac would never be like _him_.

Sometimes that was the only thought that kept Isaac from giving over control to the werewolf inside him. It was all well and good that Isaac’s anchor was the few good memories he still had of his dad, but that didn’t make all the bad ones magically disappear. And he needed to remember the bad ones to remind himself of the stakes. His dad had done plenty of damage _without_ supernatural strength. Isaac could so easily become an even worse monster than his father if he let himself slip. The thought was chilling.

Too bad it hadn’t stopped Isaac from making an ass of himself in the kitchen.

 _I can’t hurt her again_ , Stiles had said, in a voice so rawly honest it took Isaac completely by surprise, and _fuck_ if the words hadn’t given Isaac a hope that he’d never dared to have. If Stiles’s only objection to what had almost happened in the kitchen was Malia, then… then maybe Isaac’s hopeless crush had never been as impossible as he’d thought it was.

Fuck.

* * *

MALIA

Malia was proud of herself. She’d only _slightly_ burned the toast, which was much better than the last time she’d used the toaster. Although, she’d probably still used too much butter. It had melted all the way through the toast again, making it look soft and wet, and it was leaving oily spots on the plate. Isaac had pretended not to laugh the last time, but he’d still eaten the piece she’d offered him, especially once she’d told him she’d done it on purpose. She hadn’t, and Isaac had probably known that, but he’d let her get away with the lie. Still, she’d liked the taste, and not knowing how Stiles liked his toast, she figured it was probably good enough for him, too. Besides, he was sick, and she was doing something nice for him, so he would just have to deal with it.

When she took the plate into the second bedroom, Malia was only a little surprised to find that Stiles was already sound asleep. She watched him for a moment, trying to decide if he needed food right now enough that she should wake him up. He’d probably wake up on his own again if he got _really_ hungry. So she quietly backed out of the room and shut the door.

Hearing Isaac in the living room, Malia went to offer him the buttery toast instead. She could make more for Stiles later. But she only came out just in time to see the front door of the apartment close behind Isaac. Who hadn’t even said goodbye, let alone kissed her, before he’d left, like he usually did lately even if she was still sleepy when it was time for him to go to school. He’d hugged her in the hallway, but it wasn’t the same thing. Had Malia done something wrong? She didn’t _think_ she’d done anything wrong, but everyone was acting so weird.

Confused and disappointed and only partially sure why, Malia sat down on the couch with the plate she was still holding. She took a bite of the now-cold toast and wondered how she was supposed to figure out what was wrong if Stiles wouldn’t tell her the truth and Isaac wouldn’t talk to her at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you for reading! We keep saying this, but this fic (and your comments) are the bright spot in our week/month/life, which has been Necessary lately. We'll do our best to keep posting these on Fridays/Saturdays, though our schedules might cause some delays.


	9. Qui craint de souffrir, il souffre déjà de ce qu’il craint / He Who Fears Suffering is Already Suffering That Which He Fears

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which everyone thinks they know what's best for everyone else.

MALIA

Several hours after Isaac had left and Stiles had gone back to bed, Malia was still feeling confused and frustrated. She’d wrapped herself in Isaac’s bathrobe and gone up to watch the sunrise from the rooftop of the apartment building. She’d heard people say that fresh air can “clear your head,” so maybe that would help, but mostly she just needed some space.

Malia liked being up high. Even though tall buildings were nothing like trees, the height usually made her feel kind of like she was back in her woods, far away from people and dumb human problems. But not this time. She listened to the city wake up and couldn’t stop thinking about Stiles and Isaac not liking each other, which then reminded her that even though Stiles was sick, she was still mad at him, which made her frustrated and confused all over again.

Hunger finally drove her back inside and, after checking to see if Stiles was awake yet, Malia made herself scrambled eggs and more slightly burnt, extra buttery toast.

Still bundled up in Isaac’s bathrobe, Malia took her meal and settled down on the living room floor beside the coffee table. She ate with her fingers and flipped through her Paris guidebook, leaving greasy smudges on the pages.

Even a quick glance through the guidebook showed how much Malia had seen in just a few weeks. She’d checked off every major tourist attraction, even the museums (which had sometimes been boring, but slightly less boring when Isaac was there), and tried most of the recommended cafés. She’d even started spending whole days just walking the Seine or wandering the arrondissements listening to street performers and following her nose to all the different bakeries and markets.

And it was nice. There would always still be things to see and do and eat, but Malia felt like she’d gotten everything out of her trip to Paris that she’d wanted and more.

She hadn’t thought much about what would come after Paris since she’d arrived, but seeing Stiles again had reminded her that Paris was only supposed to be her starting point for exploring Europe. Maybe it was time to start thinking about where to go next.

Since she’d never talked to Isaac or Stiles about places they would want to travel, Malia decided to make a list of places that interested her. Then they could all choose from those options once Stiles was feeling better and Isaac’s semester was over. She still didn’t think the situation with the Paris werewolves was as bad as Isaac said, so really all they had to do was be a little careful for a few weeks and then they could all go someplace new and explore it together. 

Malia was sitting on the couch, using Isaac’s laptop to compare Barcelona and Madrid, when Stiles finally woke up. She’d heard him the moment he’d sat up in bed, her inner coyote instinctively keeping an ear out for him, but since it seemed like everything was okay she didn’t bother getting up. The toilet flushed, the sink ran, and Stiles shuffled out into the living room.

The way his eyes had become more focused told Malia that Stiles was a lot better than before, but she knew it was still polite to ask, “How are you feeling?”

“Still sore, but my head finally feels clear again.” Stiles rolled his neck, which made a few small popping sounds. “Did Isaac ever get any tea?”

Malia jumped to her feet, leaving the open laptop on the coffee table. She was in charge of making sure Stiles had tea and water and medicine while Isaac wasn’t home.

“I think it’s with the coffee.” Malia started heading for the kitchen but Stiles waved her off.

“I can find it.”

Frowning, Malia followed him into the kitchen. Stiles was supposed to let Malia and Isaac take care of him.

“I can make food for you,” she said, watching Stiles look through Isaac’s unnecessarily large coffee collection. _Excessive_ , Isaac had agreed. “You didn’t eat earlier. I had eggs and toast.”

It was closer to lunch than breakfast now. Stiles was probably starving. Eggs were a breakfast food, but even though it was almost lunch time for Malia and Isaac, wasn’t it technically still breakfast time for Stiles since he’d just gotten up? Malia still didn’t completely understand why certain foods were supposed to be for different meals.

“Nah, I got it.” Stiles pulled out a box of herbal tea and made a face at it before putting it back. “I appreciate it, but you don’t have to wait on me.”

“But--”

“Malia, really, I’m feeling much better.” Stiles cut her off with an amused look. “And it’ll be good for me to be up for a bit.”

“We could go out,” Malia suggested. Maybe Stiles didn’t want eggs but was too polite to say anything. “There’s a little café a few blocks down. I bet they have tea!”

Stiles made a face that said _tired_ and _no_ and _but don’t be offended_ at the same time. _Grimace_. That was the word for that face. “I’m probably not up for an adventure yet. Maybe we could go out for dinner later? If I’m still feeling better?”

“Okay,” Malia agreed, though she hated _maybes_. Maybes meant she couldn’t do anything or make any decisions. Maybes meant she had to wait. Malia hated waiting. But Stiles was sick, so she would wait for Stiles to decide. So she sat down at the kitchen bar and watched Stiles pull the eggs out of the fridge. Isaac had said that in Paris, they could be left out, but Malia kept forgetting and putting them away. 

Aside from directing him to the drying rack for a pan and handing him the salt and pepper from their place on the bar, Malia let Stiles cook his eggs on his own. It was strange, because she knew he could do it on his own, but she also couldn’t stop remembering how hot his skin had been yesterday, how scared she’d been when he’d suddenly sweat through the sheets even though Isaac had said it was a good sign because it meant the fever was gone. Malia watched Stiles carefully for signs of it coming back, but aside from being even more pale than usual, Stiles did look better.

When he was done cooking, Stiles sat down beside Malia to eat and asked her to tell him about her trip so far. He’d cooked the eggs in circles so the yellow part was still separate from the white part. Malia had tried that once and everything fell apart. But she liked the way scrambled tasted, so it wasn’t worth the bother of trying to learn.

A part of Malia was suspicious that Stiles was only asking her about her trip so she would stop worrying about him. But if it was meant as a distraction, it was a good one. Despite everything that had happened, Malia wanted to share Paris and Isaac with Stiles, just like she wanted to share wherever they all would go next. They might not have enough time to go to all the places Malia had been again with Stiles, but if she told him about them then maybe he could choose ones he was really interested in.

“I can’t wait to show you the Eiffel Tower and the painters along the Seine! Isaac calls the places in my book tourist traps because there’s always so many people around, but I don’t mind.” The more Malia thought about it, the more excited she got about the idea of Stiles getting to see all her favorite places. That way, she’d get a chance to see them again, too. Maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing that Stiles had come, after all, though she was still mad that no one had told her.

Stiles raised one of his eyebrows. “You’re telling me you got _Isaac_ to go up to the top of the Eiffel Tower?”

“Yeah, well.” Malia wrinkled her nose, remembering how uncomfortable he’d been. “He didn’t like it as much as I did.”

“I kinda figured,” said Stiles. “Isn’t the elevator, like, really small? He didn’t tell you he’s claustrophobic?”

Malia shook her head, not familiar with the word, but figured it had to do with what had made Isaac uncomfortable that day. “He told me after that he doesn’t like small spaces.”

“That’s one way of putting it,” said Stiles. He set his fork down on his empty plate and pushed it out of the way. “He must like you a lot.”

Malia shrugged. She wasn’t really sure what Isaac’s _claw-straw-fo-bee-a_ had to do with whether or not he liked her. “I didn’t know he liked me at all until we were up there.”

Stiles cocked his head to the side like a dog. “What do you mean?”

“I was really scared to go out alone here at first,” Malia admitted, scratching one of her clipped human fingernails across the bartop. “I don’t know French and I didn’t want to get lost. I thought maybe that was the only reason Isaac offered to go with me, but then he kissed me and gave me his scarf because it was cold.”

“He what?” Stiles made an almost-choking sound after trying to talk and drink water at the same time.

Malia watched Stiles until it was clear he wasn’t actually choking, then said, “He might’ve given me his scarf first.”

“No, go back,” said Stiles. “You’re telling me you and Isaac had your first kiss at the top of the Eiffel freaking Tower?”

“Yeah?” Malia did her own dog-like head tilt, because Stiles wasn’t making any sense. “Why?”

“Nope, nothing,” Stiles said quickly. “That’s really cute, is all I was going to say. Super cute. The cutest.”

“What?” Malia frowned, feeling like Stiles was making fun of her but she couldn’t figure out how or why. “Is that weird?”

Stiles sighed, stood, and took his dishes over to the sink. “No, it’s genuinely adorable. I’m happy for you guys.”

And even though Malia couldn’t hear a lie in his heartbeat, Stiles’s voice still sounded kind of sad. Or something that was like sad but more complicated. Maybe he was still tired from being sick.

Malia took a sip of Stiles’s water, which was still sitting on the counter. She watched the movement of his shoulder blades through his T-shirt as he reached for something in the sink, and suddenly she remembered all over again how much she’d missed him.

Before she knew what she was doing, Malia had gotten up and wrapped her arms around Stiles from behind and hooked her chin over his shoulder, tucking her face against his neck.

* * *

STILES

Stiles nearly dropped the mug he was washing. Isaac’s mug from that morning, Stiles’s treacherous brain supplied, because even with Malia’s arms wrapped around him--a feeling Stiles had missed more than anything in the world--he couldn’t stop thinking about the heat in Isaac’s gaze that morning, the _intention_ behind it. 

The parallels between the two encounters made Stiles even more certain that he was just getting in the way here.

“Malia…” Stiles set down the mug and gripped the edge of the sink instead. “I’m not sure we--”

“You’re not supposed to do chores when you’re sick,” she interrupted him. She let go of his waist so she could nudge him out of the way and snatch up the sponge. There had been a moment while he’d been speaking where Malia’s body seemed to tense up against his back for a split second, but she’d released him so quickly just afterward that he couldn’t be sure if he’d just imagined it.

“Malia,” he tried again, but she shook her head and pointed in the direction of the living room with a sponge-filled hand.

“I let you make tea and cook,” she said firmly. “Now you have to go sit down and rest or I’ll tell Isaac you’re not letting me take care of you.”

Deciding that continuing to fight Malia on this issue would only upset and confuse her for no good reason, Stiles relented, thanked her, and did as she’d commanded. On his way out of the kitchen he caught himself smiling at the fact that Malia was under the impression that Isaac had some kind of doctor-patient authority over Stiles. 

Stiles dropped down heavily onto the couch. He was frustrated by how tired he was already even though he’d barely done anything today. Well, since waking up for the second time. There had been a pretty big emotional expenditure with Isaac in the kitchen that morning, but Stiles didn’t think that should count considering nothing had _really_ happened.

 _Yet_ , a wicked voice in the back of his mind whispered. Nothing had really happened _yet_.

No. That line of thought led nowhere good. Stiles had stopped Isaac for a reason. Malia could get hurt.

 _Hurt worse_ , that same voice reminded Stiles.

There was something to that. Malia had already been hurt by both of them (though Stiles’s offense was much worse than Isaac’s). It might not be impossible to fix that, to somehow find a way for all of them to stop being angry and awkward. But that would take time, and time was something they were quickly running out of. An angry werewolf pack was circling, and Stiles had held things up by getting sick. They needed a plan, and soon.

The sound of running water and clattering dishes stopped after a couple of minutes. When Malia came into the living room, she looked… lost. The expression only lasted for a second, but Stiles caught it, and he knew it was his fault. He wasn’t supposed to be here, sitting on the couch where Malia had clearly been making plans before he’d woken up. He was messing up her big Europe adventure.

He knew because he’d seen the travel site open to a page about Spain on her laptop, just like he’d known Paris wasn’t the only place she’d wanted to see when she’d left Beacon Hills.

But maybe the fact that she was planning was actually a good thing. Stiles had been wondering how he was going to talk to Malia about leaving, but if Malia was already thinking about going to Spain, that would at least get her out of Paris, which would take care of the immediate threat. Unfortunately, without knowing anything about the customs of Spanish werewolves, or any other supernatural creatures that may or may not live there, Stiles had no idea if it would be any safer for her there. Isaac might know.

Hell, Isaac might be able to go _with_ her. Then in addition to Stiles thinking about them kissing on top of the Eiffel Tower, he’d be thinking about them kissing on the Spanish Riviera or some other equally cheesy romantic place. Places that Stiles _refused_ to be jealous thinking about because then he’d have to consider which one of them he was jealous of.

(A first kiss at the top of the Eiffel Tower, though? Seriously?)

So when Malia finally came and sat down beside him on the couch, Stiles specifically _did not_ ask about Spain or plans because then he’d probably have to come clean about Isaac’s plan for fixing the aggro werewolf problem, and considering that Stiles didn’t even know how he felt about it--that was a lie, Stiles hated Isaac’s plan because it didn’t involve Isaac leaving too--it would probably be better not to bring it up just yet.

Besides, Malia already had plenty of things to be mad at Stiles about. Why tell her that Isaac and Stiles thought it would be best for her to leave Paris and risk making her even angrier?

But not telling her would mean keeping something from Malia. _Again_. And Stiles had promised he wouldn’t do that.

But telling her would make her mad at him. _Again_.

The clarity Stiles’s brain had regained after sleep was beginning to fade. Malia was right; he did still need to rest. He’d tell her, if he needed to. He would. Just not today. Not when he was still so tired, and she looked so confused, and all he wanted was to hold her and not feel guilty about it.

He’d tell her. Just not now.

* * *

MALIA

It hurt, Malia realized with confusion, not to be touching Stiles right now. To be sitting only a few inches away from him, and not reaching out, because she’d felt how he’d tensed up in the kitchen when she’d put her arms around him, and she didn’t want him to feel uncomfortable. But not being close to Stiles still felt wrong. She’d forgotten how _right_ it felt to be with him. 

Back in Beacon Hills, she’d been so angry with Stiles for not telling her the truth about Peter that she’d ended up running from Stiles and going after her bitch of a mother instead. Stupid thing to do. And here she was in Paris, running away again. Hiding in a “den” with Isaac, who was connected enough to home that it comforted her, but who didn’t know the girl she was there.

It occurred to Malia then that maybe Isaac was doing the same thing she was. The difference was that Isaac had figured out that they couldn’t run and hide forever. They’d needed Stiles, like Isaac had said. But not just to save them from the Paris werewolves. To come find them.

“I missed you,” Malia confessed, looking over at Stiles. Her voice came out rough because her throat felt tight. “I didn’t know I missed you, but I did.”

Stiles gave Malia a happy-sad smile that made her throat feel tighter. Her fingers kept trying to touch his soft T-shirt without her permission, so she curled them into fists. She’d felt his discomfort in the kitchen. He didn’t want her to touch him now that he was getting better.

“Missed you too,” he whispered. “But I knew I did.”

Malia didn’t realize she was crying until Stiles’s thumb was wiping tears off her cheekbones, and suddenly it was all just too much. It was almost like losing control of her coyote: one minute she was holding her body rigidly still, and the next she found herself in Stiles’s lap, her arms thrown around his neck, hugging him tightly and burying her face in his neck so she could wallow in his scent. She’d apologize for touching him later. She felt bad about it but in that moment she needed, more than anything, to be close to him.

“Hey,” said Stiles, and made some soft shushing noises as his arms closed around her back. That contact, him not rejecting her closeness, made Malia shudder with relief. “Hey, it’s okay.”

“I hate this,” Malia said through her stupid, frustrating tears. “First I was mad at you, then I was mad at Isaac for bringing you here, and now…” She swallowed to try to ease the thick feeling in her throat. “Now I just don’t want to be mad anymore.”

Stiles’s grip on her back tightened a little, and she let her head fall onto his shoulder. He was so warm. He smelled so good. It felt _right_. It felt so right to be with Stiles.

“For what it’s worth, I don’t want you to be mad either,” Stiles murmured into her hair.

Malia nuzzled her cheek against Stiles’s shoulder, even though she knew her tears would get his shirt wet. And she remembered: “Isaac said forgiveness makes it stop.”

“For some people, yeah, I think it helps. I do owe you an apology.” Stiles cleared his throat and shifted until Malia’s ear was directly over his heart. “I didn’t mean to keep secrets from you or make decisions for you, but I did, and I’m sorry. It wasn’t fair of me and I would do _anything_ to make it right.”

Malia heard the truth of it in Stiles’s voice and the steadiness of his heartbeat and it made her start crying all over again. She didn’t know how long Stiles held her like that, but Malia didn’t move or say anything else until she didn’t think there were any more tears inside her. Completely exhausted, she tried to let herself enjoy the feeling of being in Stiles’s arms and thought about how nice it would be to nap like this on the couch with him until Isaac came home. It was just a shame that he and Stiles probably still had to work out their own forgiveness before Isaac would join them.

“I forgive you,” she murmured into Stiles’s chest. For a second she wasn’t sure if he’d heard her, but then he squeezed her tighter for just a second before letting go and allowing Malia to sit up.

Stiles was smiling at her, and it looked like maybe he’d been crying a little too, and Malia couldn’t help but kiss him then, because kissing him had always felt right, and something inside her ached for it.

For a few seconds, Stiles kissed her back, and it almost felt like it used to feel, before she’d been angry with him. His taste sent a flood of memories rushing through Malia’s mind. Happy memories. Memories of a time when she’d felt loved and protected even when terrible things had been happening all around them.

But then Stiles pulled back and shook his head.

“We can’t,” he said, and he didn’t look at her eyes when he said it.

Malia frowned, confused. “Why not? I’m not mad at you anymore.”

“It’s not that.” Stiles looked down at one of his own hands, which was fidgeting with the blanket he was sitting on.

“Then what?”

“Isaac,” he said, in a voice that was strangely rough.

“What about him?” Malia’s heart sank. Did Stiles and Isaac really dislike each other so much that it made Stiles not want to be close to Malia?

“It might… He might…” Stiles was still avoiding her eyes, and it made Malia want to grab his face and force him to look at her. He took a deep breath and sighed it out. “Maybe it’s a stupid human thing, but there are… rules. About this kind of stuff.”

Malia felt her own eyebrows move closer together. “I don’t understand.”

“Usually, when someone, uh,” Stiles said as he fidgeted with the blanket, “when someone’s been kissing someone else for a while, they’re sort of expected not to kiss other people, especially people they used to kiss.”

“Oh,” said Malia. She frowned again. “Would Isaac be mad at me if he found out?”

“Honestly? I don’t know. He _said_ he wouldn’t but…” Stiles sighed. “This morning I thought I finally figured something out with him, but… I don’t know. I just don’t want to mess anything up.”

“Are you mad at me?” Malia asked, even though she was afraid of the answer. She’d just gotten Stiles back. She didn’t want him to be mad because of her. But why would kissing her mess things up if Stiles wasn’t mad and Isaac said he wouldn’t be mad? It didn’t make any sense, and it made even less sense every time Stiles answered her questions about it.

“No,” said Stiles, and he took her hand and laced their fingers together and squeezed. “No, Malia, I’m not mad. You didn’t know.”

“I just miss kissing you,” said Malia, and there was something strange and kind of sad in Stiles’s eyes when she looked up at him. She didn’t want Stiles to be sad, either. In some ways it would be better if he were mad than sad. Kissing was supposed to be something fun and happy: late nights in Stiles’s room when she distracted him from homework, lying in the grass at the base of the Eiffel Tower with Isaac. Kissing was one of the most wonderful things in Malia’s life, and it hurt not knowing why she couldn’t have that anymore with the person who’d been the first to kiss her.

“I miss it, too,” he whispered. He tucked her hair behind her ear with his free hand, and squeezed her hand with his other one gently before letting it go. “I swear, Malia, I miss it a lot. This isn’t because of anything you did. We just… can’t. Not without talking to Isaac, okay?”

“Okay,” Malia said, even though she didn’t really feel okay about it. Her skin felt cold now that Stiles wasn’t touching her, and she forced herself to pull away from him and sit on the other side of the couch again.

It didn’t make sense to her, and Malia hated when things didn’t make sense. Stiles had said that Isaac said he wouldn’t be mad if Stiles and Malia kissed, right? And Isaac wasn’t the kind of person who would lie about that. Or at least, Malia didn’t _think_ he’d lie about that. Why would he? And why was Stiles making such a big deal about kissing anyway? If they both wanted to do it, why shouldn’t they? Why was it so serious now when it hadn’t been before?

Malia drew her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around her shins, resting her chin between her knees. She hated this feeling, of not understanding something that seemed obvious to other people. And this time, it didn’t just make her feel stupid. It _hurt_. She wanted to be close to Stiles like she used to be. She wanted to kiss and touch him. She wanted to do a lot of the same things with him as she did with Isaac now. Why wasn’t that okay? Why did people only get to keep one person?

No matter how hard she thought about it, it still didn’t make any more sense. She’d have to ask Isaac to explain it.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac decided to walk his bike home that day after finishing at the after-school program. He’d been too tired to focus during his lecture that morning, then spent the next several hours (unsuccessfully) trying not to fall asleep at the library while doing work for his online courses.

The only benefit of his unexpected library nap was that he’d managed to get through the rest of the day without having to make an extra stop for coffee. Although he was seriously considering one for the trip home. He could smell chocolate and freshly ground coffee beans every time he passed a café and, considering how many of those there were on his route, it was slowly driving him crazy. Halfway home he couldn’t resist anymore and went a block out of his way to go to a sandwich shop he’d taken Malia to before. They did a great espresso and an even better _jambon beurre_. Isaac would get his caffeine and wouldn’t have to cook dinner when he got home.

It was only after he’d already gotten three sandwiches and was on his way home again that Isaac realized he probably should have texted or called Malia or Stiles to see if they might want something else. Well, to see if Stiles did, anyway. Isaac had learned that Malia would eat almost anything placed in front of her. Probably a byproduct of her coyote upbringing. Not much chance to be picky out in the woods.

Whatever, it was free food. Stiles could deal.

Unless Stiles was upset about that morning.

Remembering again how stupid he’d been made the espresso sit heavily in Isaac’s stomach. 

Not _stupid_. Insensitive. Thoughtless. Reckless.

 _Stop_.

Going down that well-worn road of self-loathing again wouldn’t help anyone. Isaac would apologize to Stiles for that morning and they’d move on. Literally, in Stiles’s case. The sooner he convinced Malia to go back to the States with him, the sooner Isaac could stop thinking about… well, everything.

The rest of the trip home seemed to take no time at all. He’d been so wrapped up in his thoughts that he was almost surprised to find himself putting his key in the lock and opening the front door.

They were lying on the couch together in a pose that suggested that Malia, if not both of them, had been asleep before she’d heard Isaac in the hallway. (She always heard Isaac in the hallway before he opened the door.) Stiles appeared to be determinedly sticking to some kind of pose that could count as platonic lounging. Though they were both lying down with Malia playing “little spoon” for once, Stiles had one arm tucked beneath his own head and one at his side rather than around Malia’s waist. It was a valiant effort at being “just friends,” but no one could look at Stiles and Malia together and not see the easy intimacy between them. The extent to which Stiles was trying not to be too close with Malia only highlighted how awkward it looked when they _weren’t_ close.

Isaac wanted to tell Stiles that there was no reason to deny himself the privilege of holding Malia, that Isaac genuinely wanted them to be close again, no matter what that meant for Isaac. But those weren’t things that could ever be said aloud.

“You’re back,” Malia said to Isaac from the couch, where she was stretching languorously. The words were a simple statement, but they carried a joyful welcome that Isaac already knew he would painfully miss after she’d left. He couldn’t help but admire the obvious strength of her lean muscles as she hauled herself to a sitting position so she could roll her shoulders. Isaac didn’t realize he wasn’t the only one watching her until his eyes connected with Stiles’s over her shoulder. The contact was almost as intense as a physical touch, and Isaac’s eyes skated away from it on instinct.

Malia must’ve noticed the tension of that moment, because she looked from Isaac to Stiles and back, and frowned. Convinced that any question she might ask in that moment would lead nowhere good, Isaac held up the bag of sandwiches.

“I brought food.”

Malia’s frown instantly spread into a smile of delight as her eyes lit up. In one effortless movement she sprang from the couch and snatched the bag from Isaac’s hands.

“You didn’t kiss me goodbye this morning.” Her expression was somewhere between a pout and a look of indignation, as if he’d committed a rude oversight.

And because she was so blunt, and she was wearing his bathrobe, and soon they wouldn’t belong to each other anymore, Isaac dipped his head and pressed a kiss to her lips even though Stiles was right there.

Apparently appeased, Malia immediately sat down on the floor near the coffee table and began setting out each of their sandwiches in preparation for immediate consumption.

With Malia occupied, there was no excuse for Isaac and Stiles not to speak to one another.

Isaac had planned on apologizing as soon as he saw Stiles. He’d even rehearsed what he’d say on the way home. _Stiles, I’m sorry I overstepped this morning. It won’t happen again_. Isaac had repeated it over and over until it had become a mantra.

But planning to apologize and _actually_ apologizing turned out to be two very different, very difficult things because what actually came out of Isaac’s mouth was:

“If you’re done being helpless, napkins are in the kitchen.”

“Not gonna come with me and get a chance to corner me again?” said Stiles, already standing up from the couch.

The funny thing was that Isaac couldn’t even deny that he was tempted. He did want to press Stiles up against the counter or the wall and finally see once and for all what might be between them, to pick up where Stiles had made them leave off that morning. And the fact that it was _Stiles_ who had brought it up meant that he’d still been thinking about that moment between them earlier, too.

This was the moment in their conversations where it always happened: Isaac would make a comment, Stiles would say something smart-mouthed or antagonistic, and Isaac would bite back until either someone interrupted them or the tension ran its course.

Isaac felt the old instinct rising to protect himself, his lips pulling back into a sneer as Stiles passed him on his way to the kitchen. It would have taken almost no effort at all to smile instead, but this dynamic was familiar ground. Familiar ground was safer. Familiar ground kept them significantly farther apart.

But even as Stiles left the room, Isaac couldn’t help feel that even with a room, a girl, and a thousand unsaid things between them, they were still too close.

Isaac turned back toward the couch to find that Malia had finished “setting the table” with all three sandwiches unwrapped and sitting several inches apart. Two were placed so that people could sit next to each other on the couch, while Malia’s was set near where she sat on the floor. Guess that meant Stiles and Isaac would be sitting next to each other while they ate.

“Are you guys going to eat or what?” she asked impatiently.

“Yeah,” said Isaac, schooling his mouth into a smile. On his way over to the couch, he absently pulled the neck of his robe back up over Malia’s shoulder, as it had slipped while she’d been arranging their dinner. She caught Isaac’s wrist and gave his hand an affectionate nuzzle that turned Isaac’s smile genuine. But when she let it go, Isaac chose the seat on the couch that was farther away from her. If this was going to work, Stiles needed to be the one at her side.

* * *

STILES

What a mess. What a beautiful, bewildering, devastating _mess_.

It wasn’t Malia’s fault. She genuinely didn’t understand jealousy, or possessiveness, or the complicated rules that governed the ways that people behaved together in private versus in public. Stiles had been able to teach her some of the basics there--like always wearing clothing around other people and not trying to jump Stiles’s bones at school--but there were certain “social graces” she’d probably never grasp. And if he were honest with himself, Stiles didn’t want her to learn how to always be polite and act “appropriately,” because then she wouldn’t be the Malia he knew, and despite his lecturing her, he loved Malia the way she was.

But not understanding the nuances of romantic and sexual relationships meant that Malia didn’t really know how to be an _ex_ -girlfriend, which in itself could be a problem, but in the presence of someone who could be considered her new boyfriend was extremely complicated. The fact that she hadn’t thought twice about sleeping naked in bed with Stiles would’ve been awkward enough without the added surrealness of Isaac supposedly not minding.

And since Stiles didn’t know how Isaac and Malia defined their relationship (if at all), he had no way of determining how he should feel about Malia’s behavior toward himself. Sure, Malia had kissed him, and it had been wonderful, but maybe she’d only done it on reflex. _I just miss kissing you_ , she’d said. Kissing someone because you used to date and felt comfortable with them wasn’t the same thing as kissing them because you wanted a relationship with them now. It was the second time in one day that Stiles had said no to someone he desperately wanted to kiss, to keep kissing.

Stiles had never been good at saying no to Malia. He’d directed her in learning about social conventions, but when it came to what she’d wanted from him, there was never any discussion (hence Stiles becoming the little spoon). Her affection was so open and her desires were so direct that she was very difficult to resist. So when she demanded that both he and Isaac sit and watch a movie with her on the couch, he obediently sat down next to her on the opposite side from Isaac, and when she got sleepy and sprawled out with her head in Isaac’s lap and her calves resting on Stiles’s thighs, he went along with it.

And it was strange, and beautiful, and painful, to glance over every now and then in the darkened room and see that Isaac was looking down at Malia more than he was looking at the screen, and that his expression was unlike any Stiles had seen on Isaac. It was soft, and calm, and his fingers absently played with her hair in a way that told Stiles he’d done it many times before. Who was this person? And why did it hurt Stiles to discover him?

Then Stiles glanced one time too many, and for several agonizing seconds, his and Isaac’s eyes connected. Stiles didn’t breathe. He couldn’t move. And then an abrupt change in lighting from the movie flashed off Isaac’s werewolf irises, and Stiles jerked his head away. It was excruciating. Stopping Isaac that morning in the kitchen had been one of the most difficult things Stiles had ever done, and that was saying a _lot_ considering the shit he’d dealt with since Scott had gotten himself bitten by a werewolf and thrown all of their lives into chaos. (And Stiles understood real chaos more than most people did.)

It would’ve been so easy to give in. It would’ve felt so wonderful. It was what Stiles had been waiting for, wondering about, obsessing over, for what felt like ages. The unknown thing between them. The question mark: _Isaac and Stiles?_ And today the question had finally been answered. An unspoken but also unmistakable exclamation: _Isaac and Stiles!_ Isaac had done what Stiles had never been brave enough to do. He’d made the first move. He’d put his cards on the table.

And Stiles had pulled away.

He’d told Isaac it was because of Malia. And that wasn’t untrue: it wasn’t _not_ because of Malia. Stiles loved Malia, and he knew what it felt like to betray her, and nothing, _nothing_ , not even a chance at something he wanted more desperately than almost anything, would make him risk doing that to her again. It _was_ because of Malia.

But it wasn’t _only_ because of her.

Truthfully--and Malia had taught Stiles that truth was a precious thing--Stiles had done it because he was scared. It didn’t take a brilliant psychiatrist to figure that out, but there it was. He was scared. Because if the answer to the question, _Isaac and Stiles?_ was _Yes!_ , then the next question was: _What now?_ And Stiles had no idea what now. He’d never thought past the first question. Even when the question had basically consumed him, he’d still never stopped to think about what he’d do with the answer.

And it was too scary, and it was too much, and it was too late. Because Malia needed Isaac, and Stiles would never again keep her from what she needed.

The movie ended, and the sound of the credits rolling caused Malia to stir sleepily. Stiles didn’t dare look back over at her and Isaac, but Malia’s legs slid off his thighs as she sat up halfway, leaning into Isaac.

“Bed?” Stiles heard Isaac murmur to her. It was an intimate kind of question, the kind that suggested it had been asked many times before. One word, and it implied so much.

“Carry me,” was Malia’s answer.

Isaac snorted. “You’ve got two legs-- _four_ sometimes. You can walk.”

“I don’t _want_ to walk,” she complained.

“Tough shit,” said Isaac, clearly stifling a smile. “I’m not carrying you.”

Malia turned toward Stiles with a sleepy pout and said, “Stiles would.”

Stiles blanched, eyes flitting from Malia to Isaac and back again. This was very dangerous ground. “Uhh…”

“Stiles is a weak human,” said Isaac, without missing a beat.

“Hey!” Stiles’s awkwardness was temporarily trumped by being affronted at Isaac’s insult. “I’ve carried her before.”

“Proving my point.”

Malia stretched her arms out to Stiles, to which Isaac rolled his eyes. And how could Stiles resist the invitation to hold her again? Earlier hadn’t been enough. It would never be enough.

Stiles might have been a scrawny human for most of his life, but there was a certain level of physical fitness necessary for his FBI internship, and he’d passed the bar, so he managed to stand and pull Malia’s sleep-heavy form up into his arms without straining too much.

“You’re going to spoil her,” Isaac drawled. Malia stuck her tongue out at Isaac and then tucked her face against Stiles’s shoulder.

 _Going to_. The two words hinted at a future, at something lasting, that Stiles still wasn’t sure was within reach. What, exactly, did Isaac see when he thought about how things were “going to” turn out for Stiles and Malia? Or did he even think about it at all? Stiles could be overthinking it. He was probably overthinking it.

There was another tense moment where Stiles’s and Isaac’s eyes met again, with Isaac not quite succeeding in looking annoyed and Stiles definitely not succeeding in looking like he found all of this completely normal. But then Isaac just shrugged and led the way into the bedroom, heading for the bathroom, and leaving Stiles with nothing to do but carry his ex-girlfriend to her new boyfriend’s bed.

Stiles must’ve been tired, too, because muscle memory took over when he laid her down, letting her pull him into a hug because her arms were still around his neck. When she didn’t immediately let go, he knelt on the floor next to the bed and gently pulled her arms away to rest at her sides. There was a split second during that process, though, when he inhaled near her hair, and the scent sent a shock through him.

Isaac. It shouldn’t have been surprising, considering the fact that she’d been wearing Isaac’s bathrobe all day, but Malia smelled like Isaac. It didn’t take werewolf senses to recognize the blending of the Malia-ness he’d become familiar with and the Isaac-ness that made his stomach twist and his mouth go dry whenever they were in close proximity. (Hell, he’d been surrounded by it that morning in the kitchen.) And the Malia-ness and Isaac-ness smelled _right_ together.

“Tuck me in?”

Malia’s childlike request drew Stiles from his thoughts. It somehow recalled how close they used to be while also making clear how much things had changed: this time, Stiles wouldn’t join her later, like he’d used to if he was still doing homework when she was ready to sleep. Still, he was, as always, unable to say no to her. So he pulled the blankets up to her chin and bent to kiss her forehead instead of her lips. Even though he desperately wanted to kiss her lips again.

“’Night, Malia,” he whispered as he got to his feet.

Her eyes were already closed when she said, “’Night, Stiles.”

The bathroom door creaked, causing Stiles’s head to jerk up.

“Bathroom’s free,” Isaac said from the doorway, and stepped aside so Stiles could pass through.

“Oh, uh.” Stiles swallowed and crossed over to him without glancing back at Malia. “Thanks.”

Isaac shrugged in a way that accidentally caused their shoulders to touch as Stiles walked past him, and even that small, brief contact sparked a powerful urge in Stiles to hold Isaac, too, like he’d held Malia. But he didn’t. He couldn’t. He could hold Malia because she had been his, and she didn’t understand that she wasn’t supposed to act like she was his anymore. Isaac had never been, and would never be his. Isaac was Malia’s. And that was that.

“’Night, Isaac,” Stiles murmured as he stepped into the bathroom.

And just before he closed the door behind him, he caught the response: “’Night, Stiles.”

* * *

MALIA

Boys were so confusing. Malia’s chest was doing the achy thing it sometimes did when she was sad or lonely. Stiles had never left after tucking her in before. It wasn’t like she had expected him to stay, exactly, but she also hadn’t expected him to go. She hadn’t thought about it, really. And now all she knew was that the result didn’t feel right. Not after spending most of the day so close to him.

As soon as Isaac took off his clothes and crawled into bed with her, Malia pressed close to him, seeking his warmth and his scent to make the ache go away.

Malia couldn’t understand why Isaac and Stiles were being so _weird_ around each other. Even though she was sleepy, she’d been able to hear and feel how awkward they were when they’d said goodnight. She didn’t like that they weren’t acting like themselves--at least, not the way they acted around Malia. Stiles was supposed to make jokes and annoy everyone, and Isaac was supposed to pretend to be grumpy but not really mean it. Neither of them was supposed to be stiff or cold or… _hiding_. That’s what it was. It felt like they were hiding.

It had been so nice to have Stiles carry her and tuck her in after getting to lie on both of them during the movie. Malia had missed his scent. She liked that it was lingering on Isaac’s bathrobe now, even though she’d have to take it off to sleep comfortably. Maybe she could keep it near her pillow. When she squirmed in Isaac’s arms to undress, he made a sound that wasn’t quite a laugh and helped her. Then he tugged her close so she was lying half on top of him, like she always did when they fell asleep together. She leaned her head up to nuzzle her face near Isaac’s throat. He smelled different than Stiles, but that was because he was Isaac. They were both nice scents. Both of them smelled like _home_.

Why didn’t they like each other? Malia liked both of them, and they both liked her. So it didn’t make sense that they wouldn’t like each other, too. And it didn’t even seem like they _actually_ didn’t like each other. Malia wasn’t very good at figuring out what people were thinking or feeling, but she knew Stiles, and she knew Isaac now. She’d seen the way they’d been looking at each other sometimes. Their words were mostly awkward and flat, but their eyes said things, too, and they weren’t the same things their mouths were saying. Neither were their scents or those feeling-scents the werewolves called chemosignals. It was like they were lying, somehow, without meaning to. Like they didn’t even know they were doing it. Malia hated lies. Lies hurt people, and she didn’t want Stiles or Isaac to get hurt.

With her ear pressed against Isaac’s heart, she couldn’t help but ask him, “Why don’t you like Stiles?”

Isaac’s muscles stiffened under her body for a second, then relaxed. “I don’t not like him.”

His pulse beneath Malia’s ear was a little fast, but it was steady. Not a lie, then. But maybe a sneaky truth.

“You act weird around him,” she said. “Different than you act with me.”

A pause, then, “I like you more than I like him.” There was a strange skip in Isaac’s pulse, but Malia couldn’t tell if it was a lie. It would be a weird thing to lie about. But everything about the way Isaac and Stiles were acting was weird.

Malia was about to ask Isaac another question, but he shifted their bodies so they were lying on their sides, facing each other. He pressed his palm against her cheek and looked into her eyes.

His voice was whisper-quiet and serious when he said, “I like you more than I’ve liked anyone in a really long time.”

His words and his eyes made Malia put her hand on Isaac’s cheek, too. It seemed very important that she tell Isaac how she felt right then.

“I like you, too,” she whispered. “I don’t like a lot of people, but I really like you.”

She wouldn’t have said those words to Stiles. Stiles had used the word “love,” and he’d used it all the time. She’d said it back to him, and sometimes she’d even said it when he hadn’t. And she’d meant it. And she meant that word with Isaac, even though she didn’t say it. Different people, she’d learned since becoming human again, needed different words.

And they must’ve been the right words, because Isaac smiled at her, and kissed her, and then pulled her back on top of him and covered them both with the blankets. It didn’t fix the weirdness she was feeling about Isaac and Stiles, but it was enough for now.

* * *

ISAAC

_Why don’t you like Stiles?_

Isaac groaned internally. If he weren’t half-pinned by a snoring were-coyote girl he would’ve banged his forehead against something in frustration. Apparently his self-preservationist instinct to ice Stiles out was working if Malia thought Isaac was acting “weird” around him.

But Isaac _did_ like Stiles. In fact, he liked him now more than before. He was completely captivated by the version of Stiles who belonged to Malia. This new Stiles was older, more sure of himself. And the look Stiles sometimes had in his eyes when he thought Isaac didn’t notice him watching… Well, it made the attraction Isaac had felt toward Stiles back in Beacon Hills pale in comparison.

Maybe that was why Isaac hadn’t been able to resist upping the ante with Stiles in the kitchen. Back in Beacon Hills, they had all been under so much pressure to stay safe that they grasped for humor and bickering as a way to defuse stress and channel emotion. Isaac had hoped for a long time that Stiles might eventually feel some kind of attraction to Isaac, and in his final few months in Beacon Hills he’d been bold enough to suspect that there might really be something between them underneath the bickering and the sniping. But he’d still never acted, because there was no room for more risk in an already risky existence, and no time to process feelings when dealing with so much fear.

And now, finally, _finally_ , he knew. Because of that moment in the kitchen, Isaac _knew_ that Stiles wanted him. And he couldn’t un-know it. If he’d known, back in high school, maybe they’d have had a chance. Maybe they could’ve seen where things might lead, even under all the pressure and fear. Maybe they could’ve found time for it. But it was too late. Isaac hadn’t been brave enough then, and now it was too late. Stiles was in love with Malia, and Malia was in love with Stiles, and Isaac felt things for both of them that he couldn’t grapple with and wanted things from both of them that he couldn’t have. He’d missed his chance with Stiles, and he was about to lose Malia. And he _felt_ so much, and he _wanted_ so badly, from two very different people.

It was maddening. Sure, chemistry between two people often defied logic, but what did it say about Isaac as a person that he could be head-over-heels for the gorgeous, naked girl in his arms while also consumed by thoughts of what it would be like if her equally gorgeous ex-boyfriend were naked in Isaac’s arms instead. (Or additionally.)

_Why don’t you like Stiles?_

God, if Malia only knew the truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you for reading! We've been wanting to share this chapter for a long time, and it's even longer than usual as a special treat.


	10. Qui ne risque rien n'a rien / Who Risks Nothing Gets Nothing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Malia channels her inner therapist and neither Stiles nor Isaac is prepared.

MALIA

Mornings when Malia couldn’t sleep through Isaac’s alarm were always annoying. She knew he was just being responsible, but all she wanted was for him to stay in bed with her at least until she fell back asleep. Isaac didn’t usually have time for that, though. There had been a few mornings where she’d convinced Isaac to stay in bed longer, but then he hadn’t had time for breakfast, which made Malia feel bad, so since then she had put up with the alarm and let him go.

Malia felt Isaac fumble and drop his phone off the bedside table but it kept going. God, she _hated_ that sound. Isaac apologized and swore under his breath and felt around for it in the dark. She couldn’t wait for Isaac to be done with school. When they all travelled together, she decided, she was going to make Isaac and Stiles never set alarms and let her sleep whenever she wanted.

Too tired after not getting enough sleep yesterday, Malia bundled herself up in their comforter and cut through the shared bathroom into Stiles’s den where it was quieter. She collapsed with a sigh and snuggled up to Stiles--who was still sleeping like a normal person when it was dark out--and tucked herself around him. She fell back asleep almost instantly.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac finally managed to silence his alarm and sat up with a groan. He hadn’t gotten nearly enough sleep last night to make up for his all-nighter the previous night, but at least he hadn’t heard any more dog whistles. He was extremely grateful for that, because “I’m being threatened by a gang of werewolves” wasn’t going to cut it as an excuse for missing finals. It was like Beacon Hills all over again: juggling work and school while trying not to get murdered by the monster of the week.

At least here Isaac had Malia. Even if she’d made the problem worse and was the reason he’d had to bring Stiles in to help. Even if he was now painfully aware of the empty space on the bed next to him. It was worth it. She was worth it.

Isaac stood and made his way groggily to the bathroom. Malia hadn’t bothered to shut either of the doors on her way through, and a quick glance showed Malia snuggled up in bed with Stiles. It was probably safe to assume that Malia was no longer mad at Stiles, then.

Though Isaac didn’t have much time to spare if he wanted breakfast before school, he couldn’t help taking a moment to stand at the doorway into Stiles’s room and watch them for a moment. They fit together so naturally that it almost hurt Isaac to see them like that, but it was difficult to look away. Looking away from either of them individually was hard for Isaac; together it was nearly impossible. He watched, and listened to their slow, even breathing, and wished there was room for him in the bed, too.

Then he forced himself to look back toward the bathroom, quietly shut the door, and started getting ready to take his first final.

* * *

STILES

Stiles woke up in the possessive hold of a were-coyote-in-girl-form wrapped around him from behind. Eyes still closed, he felt the corner of his mouth quirk up in a smile.

For all his complaining to Scott about it, privately Stiles actually kind of loved being the little spoon with Malia. He liked how stubbornly she’d worked to find a way for them to cuddle and share his small bed that still allowed him to sleep where he was most comfortable. It made him feel special, having this girl--one who didn’t even really understand the feelings of others enough to be considerate of them--value his needs and try to find compromises to meet them.

It was still dark out, but Stiles felt like he’d been sleeping for a while, so maybe it was almost dawn. That meant Malia had to leave soon. Stiles reluctantly shifted in Malia’s hold so he could face her. He could see just enough in the dark to tuck her hair behind her ear and briefly press his lips to hers.

“Dad’s gonna come in soon,” he whispered. “You gotta go for now.”

Malia made a sound of sleepy protest and nuzzled her cheek against his shoulder.

“Your dad’s not here, dumbass.”

Her tone was affectionate (if you knew what Malia sounded like when she was being affectionate), which made Stiles smile again, but her words were confusing.

“How come? Even if he worked last night, he--” Stiles’s brain finally whirred into something resembling Awake Mode. “Wait. We’re not at home.”

Malia shook her head against his shoulder and then gave it a playful bite, causing Stiles’s muscles to jump.

“Hey!”

“We’re in Paris!” said Malia, not remotely repentant for the doglike nip.

Stiles groaned. He wanted nothing more than to stay in this warm bed in a blanket pile with a naked girl who was among the people he loved most in the world, but he’d promised himself he wasn’t going to mess things up for Malia and Isaac. No matter what Isaac said to the contrary, this kind of sleeping arrangement wasn’t going to help with that.

“Malia,” he said gently, “we just talked about this last night. Isaac--”

“Why don’t you like Isaac?” she cut him off. 

Stiles was so taken aback he didn’t have time to come up with a response before she continued: 

“I asked Isaac last night and he said he doesn’t not like you.” She made a sound that was halfway between irritation and frustration. “What does that even mean? Why won’t you both just tell me what you mean?”

* * *

MALIA

She knew that it probably wasn’t fair to make Stiles talk about this so soon after waking up. _Ambush_ , sounded like the right word for what she was doing. But it felt like the only way she was going to get a real answer out of him about Isaac.

“What aren’t you telling me?” she asked when Stiles didn’t answer.

Stiles rolled onto his back and let out a long, deep breath. She wanted to follow him, to roll onto his chest and curl up the way she’d become so comfortable doing with Isaac, but after everything they’d talked about last night and everything she knew they still had to talk about, she resisted the desire. Instead, she sat up so she could watch his face.

Stiles was quiet for a long time, but Malia knew the only way to get him to be totally honest with her about this would be to let him talk when he was ready. Even though that meant _being patient_ , and Malia hated being patient.

“Isaac and I… _talked_ , yesterday morning,” he said finally, looking at the ceiling instead of Malia’s face. “Before he left for school. He told me about the werewolf pack that’s been harassing you guys.”

“Okay,” said Malia. “But what does that have to do with you and Isaac?” She was trying to _be patient_ but was also determined to keep Stiles on track.

He’s eyes finally met hers. “We… kind of… almost… did more than… talk?”

The way Stiles was looking at Malia reminded her of the way he used to look at her when he was helping her with math and was waiting for her to solve some equation that he clearly thought she should be able to solve. But just like with math, Malia had no idea what Stiles was talking about. And just like with math, when she had needed him to _stop trying to make her figure it out and tell her the answers already_ , Malia lifted both eyebrows and waited.

Stiles let out another of those long breaths, but it was faster, more frustrated. Malia could tell that Stiles really didn’t want to say whatever it was that he was about to say.

“Stiles,” said Malia, and resorted again to language her therapist had suggested, even though she’d never really needed it with Stiles before: “I don’t understand. I need you to explain what you mean.”

This seemed to snap Stiles out of his awkwardness, because his expression immediately changed and he reached up to tuck Malia’s hair behind her ear. His fingers were warm when they brushed against her cheek, and Malia wanted to nuzzle into his hand. But she didn’t.

“I’m sorry,” Stiles said, and his eyes looked sorry, too. “I know I’m being confusing. I want to explain it so you’ll understand, but I still don’t completely understand, either.”

Malia frowned, because she didn’t want to make Stiles feel bad for not being able to explain, but she still wanted an answer. She was tired of Stiles and Isaac not getting along and she wouldn’t be able to fix it if she didn’t know why.

“Can you at least try?” she asked, trying so hard to be patient, but finding it more difficult with each passing second.

Stiles sighed deeply and looked up at the ceiling again, but this time it wasn’t to avoid Malia’s eyes; it was Stiles’s ‘thinking face.’

“There’s something…” Stiles rubbed at the side of his head like he could make thoughts come out that way. “There’s something between Isaac and me. It’s been there for a while. What he said is true. We don’t _not_ like each other.”

“Then how come you’re so cold to each other?” Malia asked, unable to keep herself from smoothing down Stiles’s hair where he’d messed it up by rubbing his head. It was so hard not to touch him.

“The thing between us is complicated,” said Stiles. “Sometimes it makes me confused, or scared, or… sad. And when we… _talked_ yesterday, I figured out he feels some of those things, too. And I just…” Stiles sighed and rubbed at the side of his head again. “I don’t want anyone to feel scared or sad because of me.”

* * *

STILES

As he watched her face, Stiles could see Malia trying very hard to understand. He _knew_ it must not make any sense, and he could practically hear her question before she asked it:

“And you told him that?”

If Malia ever wanted to go to school for it, she could probably make a pretty good therapist someday. She’d definitely paid enough attention during her own sessions to pick up the language. All she needed was a little more patience for other people’s problems and she’d do great. Patience wasn’t Malia’s strong suit, and Stiles was impressed she was tolerating his hedging so well right now.

“Not… in those words, exactly,” he said, hedging yet again.

There was absolutely no way Stiles could’ve said _any_ of those words to Isaac. Because if Stiles did say any of that stuff to Isaac, if he did think about what _being with Isaac_ might mean, then he’d have to consider _being without Malia_ , and _Malia being without Isaac_ , and Stiles couldn’t deal with either of those things. Not yet. Not when he’d just sort of gotten Malia back in his life. Not when she’d finally forgiven him.

Malia made a frustrated sound, opened her mouth… and then, much to Stiles’s surprise, closed it again. She took a deep breath through her nose and let it out the same way, smoothing the hair at the side of Stiles’s head again as she did so.

“I guess I can’t make you tell me if you don’t want to,” she said, and the resignation in her voice was worse than anger or sadness.

“Malia…” Stiles started, without thinking of what he was actually going to say.

But instead of giving him an expectant look and waiting for an explanation, Malia pulled away from him and crawled out of bed, wrapped in the enormous comforter she’d apparently brought with her.

“I’m gonna shower,” she said in an even tone. “Do you need the bathroom?”

Stiles shook his head, unsettled by her calm. There was nothing more to say anyway. Malia nodded to acknowledge his nonverbal response and disappeared into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her.

 _Fuck_.

Stiles needed to get out of this apartment, even just for a few minutes. He couldn’t think. Even with Isaac not there, Stiles could feel both of their presences clinging to him, tugging at him, dredging up feelings he’d tried to bury and asking questions he didn’t know how to answer.

When he stepped out onto the street he was glad he’d thought to pull on his hoodie. He didn’t really know where to go or what to do, but the sun had risen and a fair number of Parisiens were on the street headed to work or sitting at small circular tables outside of cafés eating breakfast and drinking espresso. It was strangely peaceful for such a big city, at least this time of day in this neighborhood.

Stiles wandered down random streets for a while, paying attention to where he was going only enough that he was fairly certain he’d know how to get back where he came from. If worse came to worst, he had Isaac’s address in his phone and could map it. He didn’t need or even want a destination right now. He just needed to clear his head.

Right, because a _walk_ was going to clear Stiles’s head. Even Adderall had never been able to fully accomplish that, but sure, a nice _stroll_ through Paris would get him all Zen. Stiles was so frustrated and emotionally exhausted that he felt like screaming. He’d tried to do everything right. He’d tried to keep from crossing any lines with Malia, even though she didn’t see anything wrong with it. Hell, _Isaac_ didn’t seem to see anything wrong with Stiles crossing lines with Malia.

Isaac apparently also didn’t see anything wrong with crossing lines with _Stiles_ , and even though Stiles still firmly believed that stopping Isaac from taking things further had been the right thing to do, a very big part of him still wished he had let it play out. Even a minute or two longer would’ve been enough. Even just a kiss, so Stiles would know what it was like, so he’d have something besides fantasies and a boatload of unresolved sexual tension to take home with him.

But Stiles _had_ stopped Isaac, and Isaac had respected that decision. He’d been so respectful of it, in fact, that apart from a couple of snarky comments, he’d been unnervingly polite to Stiles since then. It was as if Isaac had built a wall on top of the invisible line they’d been skirting for months, where before the only things that had kept them separated had been empty threats and toothless insults. If the best defense was a good offense, then Isaac was absolutely winning whatever this war game was they were playing.

The thing about Stiles, though? He was competitive. He didn’t like losing. And that boundary, this new separation between them, clawed at Stiles, making him want to punch through the wall, even if it left them both bloodied in the process.

This couldn’t be how things ended for all of them, could it? Malia in Spain, Isaac either with her or stubbornly staying in Paris to deal with the other werewolves alone, and Stiles going back to Beacon Hills with no indication if and when he’d ever see either of them again? After everything that had led the three of them here, it couldn’t end like this.

Stiles wouldn’t let it end like this.

* * *

MALIA

Five minutes into her shower, Malia _finally_ understood what the problem was.

Now she just needed to figure out how to fix it.

* * *

ISAAC 

Despite the last few days and that morning’s rough start, Isaac felt surprisingly good about how he’d done on his final. There had been a few minutes where he’d zoned out thinking about Stiles and Malia snuggling in bed, but he’d still managed to finish well before the time limit.

It hadn’t been the hardest exam Isaac had ever taken, but considering he still had another one tomorrow and two more next week, he was glad he’d already requested to take the whole next week off from his job at the after-school program to give himself plenty of time to recover. Considering he was going to be spending the whole weekend studying, Isaac decided he’d earned a break.

Which was something he now had the whole rest of the day to do, and could have gone straight to the library to get started on if he hadn’t forgotten his books at home. 

“You’re back.” It wasn’t a question, but there was a confused lilt to Malia’s voice when she greeted him at the door wearing his bathrobe with a towel twisted up around her head.

“You’re awake,” he teased, matching her tone.

Malia rolled her eyes and burrowed her way into his arms for a demanding hug, causing the towel to untwist itself and fall to the floor. Isaac tucked his face into her hair, not caring that it was still damp, and let himself be lost for a minute in her scent and the feeling of her arms around him.

He was going to miss this.

“Only had the one final this morning,” said Isaac when Malia finally let him go. “Just came to pick up some books so I can go study for my next one.”

Isaac went over to the stack of books on the coffee table and grabbed the ones he would need for the library.

“Do you have to go right now?” asked Malia.

Isaac looked back at her over his shoulder. Malia was still standing by the door, watching Isaac with an expression he couldn’t quite read, but that held something in it that made Isaac put the books down and turn back to her. From the silence of the apartment, Isaac could tell that Stiles wasn’t there.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

“I kissed Stiles yesterday,” Malia said bluntly.

“…Oh.” Isaac’s brain searched for a more articulate reaction, but came up empty.

“Stiles said I shouldn’t’ve done it,” she continued, “so I wanted to tell you, because I don’t like when people hide things.”

Where jealousy should’ve been, Isaac instead felt an intense spark of lust. The thought of Malia kissing Stiles caused a swoopy feeling in his stomach that was inappropriate on so many levels. And yet, the image stuck in his brain. It wasn’t helping his inability to find something appropriate to say.

“I don’t understand why I’m not supposed to kiss him,” said Malia. Her arms were crossed over her chest in a pose that exuded impatience.

 _You are_ , Isaac wanted to say. _You_ are _supposed to kiss him_. That was basically why Isaac had brought Stiles out here in the first place, wasn’t it? Because Isaac had known that reintroducing Stiles into Malia’s life would remind her how much she still loved him, how much more she needed Stiles than she needed Isaac. How much better Stiles was for her.

Isaac had known his and Malia’s break-up--if it could even be called that since they’d never officially said what they were doing together--was coming. He’d just underestimated how terrible it was going to feel hearing that she was over him. He didn’t feel terrible quite yet, because no one had officially proclaimed their relationship (such as it was) to be over, but he wished Malia would just say something definitive so they could start to work on moving on.

“What did Stiles say?” Isaac asked, before kicking himself for postponing the inevitable.

“That people don’t kiss people they used to kiss while they’re kissing new people.” Her tone was unreadable. Isaac wasn’t used to not being able to read Malia, and it was a little unsettling.

“That’s true,” Isaac agreed, trying not to betray his very complicated thoughts and feelings about the mental image of Malia kissing Stiles and the ramifications of that act.

Even in the midst of bracing for things to end, though, it was important that he make it clear to Malia that he wasn’t angry with her. “But you didn’t do anything wrong, okay? You and Stiles have a history, and you and I never officially said we wouldn’t do anything with other people.”

“I know,” said Malia. “He said you talked to him and you said you wouldn’t care, but he also said I still shouldn’t kiss him. If he doesn’t care, and you don’t care, then why isn’t it okay?”

Words were becoming difficult again. No, Isaac definitely wasn’t angry with Malia for kissing Stiles. What he actually was was turned on, to the point where even as part of his brain told him that his response was messed up, a much bigger part of his brain was telling that part to fuck off. If Malia was going to choose Stiles--as she should, he reminded himself--then why shouldn’t he enjoy the fantasy?

“I want to kiss him,” Malia said in a voice that was almost petulant in its stubbornness. “And I want to kiss you. 

Malia’s first sentence fueled Isaac’s current train of thought. The second one brought it to a screeching halt.

“You’re both being dumbasses,” she added before Isaac could respond.

A quick translation of Malia-speak supplied an intriguing proposition: Malia wanted Isaac and Stiles to share her. The part of Isaac’s brain that had been preoccupied with fantasizing kicked into overdrive.

Malia seemed to take Isaac’s facial expression as an invitation, because she finally closed the space between them again by walking over to him by the coffee table.

“Can I still kiss you?” Malia asked, as if there was a world in which he could say no. Isaac wasn’t as strong as Stiles when it came to fighting his craving for human (or were-coyote) contact.

 _Why, though?_ a self-destructive part of his brain asked. _Why would you even_ want _to say no?_ Why did both Isaac and Stiles keep insisting that Malia didn’t understand conventional relationships, keep pushing her back at each other, keep trying not to cross lines? And it wasn’t like Isaac was an expert on conventional relationships, anyway. Malia wasn’t his girlfriend. Allison hadn’t really been his girlfriend. And Stiles… Well, Stiles had been _something_ to Isaac for a long time, but it wasn’t clear if he could ever be something _more_. 

But maybe that didn’t matter for now. Maybe a relationship with Malia didn’t have to be all or nothing. Maybe it didn’t matter that she’d be leaving. That _they’d_ be leaving. Maybe…

Still, Isaac needed to be careful. He needed to make sure he was understanding her before he jumped to any conclusions. Conclusions that he desperately wanted to jump to.

“Anytime you want,” he said, and Isaac knew the look he was giving her would turn the invitation into a promise.

Her smile lit up her entire face. Hell, it lit up the entire _room_. “Within reason, right?”

“Right,” Isaac said with a laugh. “Within reason.”

He ducked his head and pressed his lips to Malia’s to underscore his promise. He could do this. Keep Malia in whatever place of his heart she currently inhabited and know that, despite time and distance, they could always come back to each other. And even though Isaac knew that would mean that he would always share Malia with other people, he decided that would be enough for him. Especially if Malia’s other person was Stiles.

As Isaac kissed Malia, the part of his brain that was still constructing fantasies started getting extra creative. He thought about Stiles watching him kiss Malia, which led to Isaac thinking about Stiles also kissing Malia, and even though Isaac wanted to stop that fantasy before it could go any further, Isaac couldn’t help but think about Stiles kissing _him_.

Malia had just started nudging him towards the couch when someone knocked on the door.

 _Stiles_ , Isaac realized, and immediately broke the kiss (because there was a big difference between _thinking_ about Stiles watching them make out and Stiles _actually_ catching them making out). Isaac tried to pull away from Malia but she didn’t let him. She bit playfully at his lip and teased several more quick kisses from him before calling out, “It’s open!”

Because of course Isaac hadn’t locked it when he’d gotten home. He’d planned on grabbing his books and leaving right away. His heart pounded in his chest, instincts telling him he was doing something wrong. Sure, Malia had slept in Isaac’s bed last night instead of Stiles’s--hell, Stiles had _put_ her in Isaac’s bed last night--so it wasn’t like Isaac had started to distance himself from Malia because of Stiles. But somehow, this almost felt like how Isaac imagined getting caught cheating on someone would feel.

“Stop freaking out,” Malia ordered, because of course she could hear Isaac’s pulse and scent his anxiety.

Isaac tried to step away from Malia, but she held on to his waist, moving her mouth from his lips to his neck just in time to give Isaac nothing to hide behind when Stiles opened the door and walked in on them.

The little flail Stiles tried to contain would’ve been cute or funny if Isaac hadn’t been so nervous.

Stiles’s intense awkwardness at finding them like that was clear from his body language, but Isaac somehow knew that it wasn’t just embarrassment causing the flush in the mole-flecked skin of Stiles’s face. It wasn’t the only thing causing the heat in Isaac’s cheeks, either.

“I’ll just…” Stiles hooked his thumb over his shoulder, gesturing out the still open door behind him. “I’m gonna… Yeah. I’m gonna just--”

Malia immediately reminded everyone in the room that she was a coyote by letting go of Isaac and springing over to Stiles in the space of a second, catching his wrist in her grasp.

“--go?” Stiles managed to finish, staring at Malia with wide eyes.

“No. No one’s leaving,” Malia said firmly. Without letting go of Stiles’s wrist, she shut and locked the front door, then led him closer to Isaac. She let go of Stiles’s wrist when they were still several feet apart, then stood so that the three of them were standing roughly in a triangle.

Malia crossed her arms over her chest and gave each of them a stern look in turn. “You both keep telling me to talk to the other. I did that. Now you guys are going to talk to each other.”

* * *

STILES

Whatever Malia’s therapist was getting paid wasn’t enough. That lady was _good_.

* * *

ISAAC

“There’s something between you guys,” Malia said quietly, when neither Isaac nor Stiles said anything. “At first I thought you didn’t like each other, but that’s not it. I know I don’t get how a lot of this stuff works, but scent doesn’t lie.”

Stiles looked at Malia, then at Isaac, and Isaac watched as Stiles’s nervousness vanished. It made Isaac’s own anxiety rise to compensate.

“What’s the scent telling you?” Stiles asked Malia, but his eyes remained on Isaac. Isaac could feel the intensity of that unwavering gaze like a physical touch.

Malia shook her head and huffed an impatient sound. “I said _you guys_ are going to talk."

Stiles cocked his head to the side. “What’s the scent telling her, Isaac?”

Like Stiles didn’t know the answer. Isaac had already given himself away in the kitchen.

But they were going to make him say it.

Isaac took a shaky breath, and he must have _really_ been failing to hide his anxiety, because Malia moved closer and wrapped her hand loosely around his wrist. Her thumb skated over his pulse, slowly, over and over, while he breathed, until he felt at least tethered, if not fully grounded.

“It… It tells her…” Isaac started haltingly. He went to raise his arm to rub at the back of his neck out of habit, but it was the one Malia still had hold of. The reminder of her presence--that she was still there with him for at least a little longer--lent him some courage.

Isaac squared his shoulders and met Stiles’s eyes as he said, “It tells her you want me. It tells both of us that.” Stiles was blushing again, which somehow made Isaac more confident. “And it tells her I want you. But you already knew that.”

Malia leaned up and gave Isaac a little affectionate nip on the jaw to show her approval.

“Stiles has to talk, too,” she commanded when Isaac didn’t speak again and Stiles just stared at Isaac.

“You’re bossy,” Stiles joked, but when Malia gave him a stern look, he finally said to Isaac, “And yeah, of course I know. I knew before yesterday. You’re not exactly subtle.”

Isaac snorted. “Like you are?”

The bitchy look Stiles gave him made everything feel almost normal. Which was no small feat considering that a girl they’d both slept with on a regular basis was forcing them to admit that they wanted to sleep with each other, too.

“So what’s the problem?” Malia demanded. She had let go of Isaac’s wrist and crossed her arms again, looking from one to the other. 

“I don’t want to mess up what you and Isaac have,” said Stiles, at exactly the same time as Isaac said, “We’re not all staying here forever.”

There was a pause, then both Stiles and Malia looked at Isaac and said, at the same time and in almost exactly the same tone, “So?”

Isaac blinked a few times, looking from Stiles to Malia and back. Could it really be that simple? Did neither of them care that there would be an expiration date on anything they started now? 

Did _Isaac_ care? Isaac had told himself that even if Malia had to leave, they could find their way back to each other every now and then, and that he didn’t mind sharing her with Stiles if that was what she wanted, too. And he did believe that. But he hadn’t been bold enough to seriously think that he could have something like that with Stiles. Stiles had occupied a closely guarded place in Isaac’s heart for so long. If Isaac opened that door, he didn’t know what it would feel like to try to shut it again.

It could hurt. There was a very high chance that it would hurt. But… But Isaac had knowingly done a lot of things that ended up hurting him. At least this one would feel good for a while before it hurt. At least this one would finally answer some questions that he’d been carrying with him for years.

When Isaac didn’t respond, Malia rolled her eyes and said, “Just kiss already and stop being weird.”

Apparently Isaac’s lack of objection and Malia’s order were all Stiles had needed to break any remaining hesitation. Isaac had maybe half a second to prepare before Stiles closed the gap between them and pulled Isaac toward him for an enthusiastic kiss.

Isaac actually _staggered_ , but Stiles helped him regain his balance. His hands were framing Isaac’s face, thumbs along his jaw, and Isaac was kissing Stiles back. The hunger he’d felt for Stiles for so long surged through Isaac’s veins, so strong Isaac would’ve sworn he heard the wolf inside him howl in victory and relief. His eyes burned and his fingertips tingled like his claws wanted to slice out. Isaac forced himself to take a deep breath through his nose, trying to rein in the wolf as he let his breath out. He wanted to be fully himself in this crucial, fragile moment. All Isaac could feel and smell and taste and hear was Stiles, and it was exhilarating.

How could this have happened? After all this time, how could they have finally, _finally_ gotten here?

A hand was pushing at his shoulder, but it was smaller than Stiles’s. Malia. _Malia_. Isaac had completely forgotten she was there. And it was clear that Malia was impatient when ignored, because she gently pushed Stiles out of the way and kissed Isaac herself.

At that point, Isaac abandoned any attempt to make sense of the situation, shoving out the voice that kept telling him _this will hurt, this will destroy you, this will ruin it for them, this is selfish, let them go before it’s too late_. Malia’s lips were comforting in their familiarity yet exciting and bewildering in this new context. Isaac’s attraction to Malia didn’t incite the same kind of chaos in Isaac, but he still wanted her, still loved her touch and taste and scent. She wasn’t less than Stiles to him, just different. He hadn’t realized his eyes had slid shut or that she had pulled away until he opened them to see Malia and Stiles kissing: a sight that was a hundred times hotter in person than in his fantasies.

 _This will destroy you_ , the voice warned again. And Isaac responded, _It’s already worth it_.

* * *

STILES

Stiles was going to send Malia’s therapist a thank-you card.

* * *

MALIA

Malia decided she would wait to tell Stiles and Isaac how stupid they’d been until after they all got to kiss a while longer. And maybe ate ice cream. Isaac was more likely to agree to get ice cream if she didn’t tell him he was stupid first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Your patience and devotion has been rewarded! Stay tuned for more Stisaalia, and thank you for reading!


	11. Jeter de l'huile sur le feu / To Add Fuel to the Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Isaac shows extraordinary self-restraint and Malia and Stiles disagree about furniture.

STILES

 _This isn’t real, this_ can’t _be real_ , a voice in Stiles’s head whispered. It was a familiar voice, one that had first appeared back when he’d started losing the ability to discern whether he was asleep or awake. Back when his life had been a dream within a dream within a dream. Back when he’d learned that in dreams you could feel the warmth of someone’s touch. When he’d learned that in dreams you could feel pain.

 _You’re dreaming_ , the voice insisted. But Stiles ignored it, because he knew this to be true: Stiles had a vivid imagination, but never could his subconscious mind have come up with what was happening to him right now, even with the help of an immortal chaos demon.

“This is real,” he heard himself murmur against Malia’s lips, which tasted like Isaac’s lips, and he couldn’t fight the giggle that burst from him and made him pull away slightly.

“Why’re you laughing?” Malia demanded, though her own mouth was quirked up in response.

Knowing exactly how each of them was going to react if he said what he was thinking, but also knowing what they’d do if he didn’t, Stiles choked back another giggle and said, “‘Two great tastes that taste great together.’”

And he was correct in his predictions about their reactions: Malia gave him a puzzled look as if he’d lost his mind, and Isaac groaned in disapproval of the stupid reference.

“What’s he talking about?” Malia asked Isaac.

“A dumb commercial that’s like twenty years older than we are,” Isaac said blandly, then looked to Stiles and said, “You’re such a fucking nerd.”

“This is news to you?” Stiles countered.

In lieu of telling Stiles to shut up, apparently, Isaac grabbed the front of his shirt and hauled him in for another kiss. Yep, no way Stiles’s subconscious could dream up how good Isaac tasted, how he smelled, how much of a relief it was to finally bridge the space between them that had tormented Stiles for months.

The contact was so intoxicating that Stiles was worried he’d rush through this crucial moment without savoring it. Like Isaac had said, they weren’t all going to be here like this forever, and though Stiles was fully willing and able to compartmentalize the future right now, he wanted to remember this.

So when Isaac went for another kiss, Stiles pulled back slightly and pressed his forehead against Isaac’s, the fingers of one hand stroking the short curls at the back of Isaac’s head, reveling in the proximity of their bodies.

When he slipped his arms under Isaac’s, he found Malia there. From his vantage point Stiles could see that she was running her palms down Isaac’s back in slow, affectionate motions, nuzzling her face against the spot between Isaac’s shoulder blades. The way Isaac subtly shifted his body to lean back into her touch spoke of an intimacy that Stiles felt strangely privileged to witness. He found, to his surprise, that he was… glad. And not just because it had led them all here, to this moment, together. He was glad that Isaac and Malia had found each other in this new place, far away from everything they’d suffered in Beacon Hills. They deserved a chance to heal.

Malia leaned up on her toes to whisper something in Isaac’s ear, and then Isaac was kissing Stiles again, hot and hungry, and Malia’s arms were around their shoulders, and if this was somehow a dream that Stiles was going to be forced to wake from, if his imagination really _was_ that creative, it would be far crueler than anything the Nogitsune had ever subjected him to.

“I like watching you guys kiss,” said Malia, blunt as ever, and he remembered then how friggin’ _hot_ her candor could be when she talked about things she wanted.

Isaac twisted so he could glance over his shoulder at her and said, “Same to you.” 

As if to make his point, he extricated himself from between them and nudged Malia into Stiles's arms. Before he did so, though, Stiles caught him nuzzling briefly at Malia's shoulder and pressing a chaste kiss to her neck. There was a tender affection between them that Stiles never would've expected from either of them considering what fierce, often violent personalities they had.

Then Malia kissed Stiles again, and there was nothing tender about it. He could feel Isaac’s eyes on them, and there was something extremely sexy about that even though maybe it should've been awkward. His brain supplied him with a barrage of images of things Isaac could watch him do with Malia, so it was lucky she interrupted that train of thought:

“See?” said Malia when their kiss broke. “You guys were being stupid for no reason.”

“Yeah, yeah, you told us so,” said Isaac. “But it’s not like I was the one playing hard to get.”

Stiles snorted. “Yeah, you were just acting weird and indecisive and sending mixed signals.”

“Mixed signals?” Isaac raised an eyebrow in a distinct ‘Are you fucking kidding me?’ expression. “Really. You wanna talk about _mixed signals_ after you spent months using the ‘boys are mean to girls they like’ flirting strategy with me.”

“Because the sarcastic eye-roll and bitchy face strategy is _so_ much more mature,” Stiles drawled. But then he remembered: he wanted to savor this. This was important. He wanted to remember it. So when Isaac opened his mouth to bicker back, Stiles said, “No.”

“No?” Isaac’s eyebrow rose a fraction higher.

“No,” Stiles repeated. “Not yet.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Isaac said flatly.

“I flew across a friggin’ ocean to get here,” said Stiles. “I thought you might hate me for the stuff that happened before you left, but I dropped everything and came anyway. And I only got you to finally admit less than five minutes ago that not only do you _not_ hate me, you also kind of want to jump my bones.”

“ _I_ got him to admit it,” Malia interjected.

“Don’t help him,” Isaac muttered in Malia’s direction.

“Point is,” Stiles continued, “I went through all that. So you’re gonna give me five minutes of sincerity before we go back to our will-they-or-won’t-they flirt-fighting.”

“Two,” said Isaac, like it was a negotiation, and basically proving Stiles’s point for him.

Stiles narrowed his eyes. “Four.”

“Three,” Isaac countered. “Final offer. And you’re wasting them.”

“Fine,” Stiles said quickly, because he knew this was the best deal he was going to be able to get out of Isaac.

“Set a timer, Malia,” said Isaac.

Stiles rolled his eyes while Malia picked up her phone from the coffee table and did as bidden. Then she said, “Go.”

Suddenly nervous again, Stiles closed his eyes and took a slow breath, then let it out. He took five more precious seconds to steady his nerves. He wanted to remember this. He _needed_ to remember this. When he opened his eyes again, he locked them with Isaac’s, resolved not to hide behind a joke for once. 

When Stiles took a step toward Isaac, Isaac flinched, small but visible. It didn’t take supernatural senses to tell that Isaac was nervous, too, and that buoyed Stiles’s confidence. Moving slowly, like he was approaching a skittish animal, Stiles stepped in close and slid his arms around Isaac’s waist, squeezing gently. Isaac’s entire body went stiff, but Stiles didn’t let go. Instead, he pressed his cheek into the crook of Isaac’s neck, enjoying the fact that Isaac was taller than Stiles, but not _too much_ taller.

A few more seconds. Then, slowly, Isaac lifted his arms and wrapped them loosely around Stiles. Stiles felt Isaac’s shaky breaths even out as his body finally relaxed. Stiles smiled against Isaac’s neck when he felt Isaac’s cheek nuzzling against his hair, heard Isaac inhale his scent, felt Isaac’s lungs slowly expand and contract against his chest.

They stood like that for what felt like a lot longer than three minutes. This was Stiles’s chance to say anything to Isaac, to ask anything, and to get a sincere answer. But he found that he didn’t want to talk. He just wanted to be close to Isaac. To be quiet with him. This contact was relatively innocent, but somehow it felt far more intimate than kissing.

Finally, he found the only words he really wanted to say:

“I like you.”

The timer on Malia’s phone sounded. No one moved or said anything right away. Stiles braced for a smartass comment, the return to flirt-fighting.

“I like you too, shithead,” Isaac murmured against his hair.

Stiles laughed, and felt Isaac’s laugh against his own chest--a beautiful sensation. Then a were-coyote girl was pushing her way into their hug so she could be part of it. 

When she headbutted Stiles affectionately, he asked, “Do I get three minutes from you, too?”

A derisive snort, fingers flicking his ear. That was Malia for ‘Yeah, right.’

* * *

ISAAC

“Okay, okay,” Isaac pretended to be disaffected as he reluctantly disentangled himself from Stiles and Malia’s hug. “That’s definitely enough of that.”

Stiles already knew too many of Isaac’s weaknesses. Letting Stiles see how badly Isaac wanted to be able to let himself have this easy affection with the two of them was dangerous. Wanting was dangerous.

So instead of giving in to what he wanted and letting himself hold them both as long as they’d let him, Isaac dumped Malia into Stiles’s arms and stepped back with a smirk.

“Seriously, some of us have things to do today,” Isaac continued. 

“Oh, can we get ice cream from that one place where they shape it like flowers?” Malia asked as she snuggled further down into Stiles’s arms.

“The gelato place?” Isaac pulled out his phone to check the time. “Yeah, they’re probably open, but you’ll have to go without me.”

“What? Why?”

Isaac grimaced. “I have to study and finish a paper.” He gestured back at the coffee table and his books.

“Isaac,” Malia whined. She squirmed out of Stiles’s arms and stepped back up to Isaac, hooking her fingers in his shirt.

“I know,” he groaned and took her face in his hands. “I’m not any happier about it than you are. Trust me.”

Except, Isaac _was_ happy, despite every reason not to be. He was so happy that even knowing he had to spend the afternoon studying instead of being with Malia and Stiles couldn’t bring him down. 

Isaac had been prepared to sever their relationship and endure the pain of letting her go. He’d been dreading it, but at the end of the day, it would have just been one more thing to recover from. He would have healed. 

He always did.

Eventually.

He pressed his lips to hers and it was such a relief to still be able to kiss her that he did it again and again, almost willing to let himself forget his responsibilities to just keep kissing her. 

An exaggerated throat-clearing interrupted them. “This’s you studying, huh?”

Isaac smiled against Malia’s lips. “Why? You offering to tutor me?”

“Looks like Malia’s got that covered,” said Stiles, running a finger down Isaac’s spine distractingly, before settling his hand near Isaac’s hip, effectively holding Isaac in a side hug “but I’d be happy to join the study group.”

Having Stiles’s arm around him in such a casually intimate way caused a pleasant shiver to run right through Isaac, one that Stiles absolutely must have felt. Isaac’s instinctive response was embarrassment, and he got ready to say something to brush off whatever smug comment Stiles ended up making, but Stiles didn’t say anything. He just tightened his arm around Isaac and started slowly moving his thumb back and forth along Isaac’s hip bone, apparently still trying to push for more a few more moments of sincerity.

“We can hang out tonight,” Stiles said near Isaac’s ear, and the words “hang out” expanded to include a dozen possibilities that sent butterflies through Isaac’s stomach. Then he gave Isaac’s hip one last squeeze and stepped away.

“Yeah,” Malia agreed, the thought seeming to cheer her up. She freed Isaac after another quick kiss. “I’ll show Stiles Paris and then we can all hang out.”

“We’re gonna go kiss at the top of the Eiffel Tower,” Stiles said with a shit-eating grin as he held his hand out to Malia.

Isaac groaned. “I can’t believe she told you.”

“Why does Stiles think it’s so funny that you kissed me there?” asked Malia, looking a bit annoyed about being left out of a joke.

“I’ll explain on the way,” said Stiles, still grinning as Malia took his hand. “Hit the books, nerd!”

“We’ll bring you food!” Malia promised.

And then Isaac was alone in the apartment, dazed, heart full, wondering how the hell he was going to find room for anything in his head besides the two people who had just left.

* * *

MALIA

Everything felt so much… _lighter_. Malia hadn’t completely realized how frustrated she’d been by Stiles and Isaac refusing to talk about their feelings, but she was really proud and happy that she’d finally gotten them to talk. Not just because kissing both of them and watching them kiss each other was really fun, but also because all the stress and secretiveness that had made the apartment feel small and closed-in-- _claustrophobic_!--was gone now.

Malia knew she was dragging Stiles along by the hand faster than he wanted to walk, but she was so excited to show him everything, to make sure he got to see Paris properly before they left. He smiled and laughed the whole time, and it did something to Malia’s heart that she didn’t fully understand. Stiles had always been fun and funny, but the whole time she’d known him he’d also been scared and sad a lot of the time, too. He’d been… weighed down.

And now she was seeing a version of Stiles that was all of the things she loved best about him, but even better. He was the Stiles he’d always been, and yet he wasn’t. But whoever he was now, she’d missed him, and she liked him, and she _loved_ him, and she was so happy to have him back in her life. In _their_ life.

She wanted Isaac to be here with them, but she knew he had to study. Malia hated studying, but school was important, and she knew Isaac liked school and wanted to do well. And there were some places she could go with Stiles that she now realized Isaac had been avoiding, like the catacombs. She’d thought he didn’t want to go because it was creepy, but now she understood how being underground would make him feel. So she and Stiles visited places that they knew Isaac wouldn’t like to go, and that made Malia feel better about Isaac being left out of their adventure.

They were in the basement of an old church when Malia heard Stiles’s stomach rumbling. Even though she’d forced him to eat two big crepes for lunch, they’d also done a lot of walking, and Malia understood _calories_ now, so she knew she had to find him some more food.

“Do you want to get a snack?” she asked him.

“We could bring something home to Isaac,” Stiles suggested. “He’s gotta need a break by now, right?”

 _Home to Isaac_. The words made Malia’s chest feel warm, and she pulled Stiles down for a kiss. She’d been kissing him all throughout the day and still couldn’t get enough. She didn’t think she’d ever have enough of either Stiles or Isaac, and it was so wonderful that she had Stiles back, and she still had Isaac, and they had each other, and nobody had to choose or be left out.

Dinnertime was really late in Paris, and a lot of stuff wouldn’t keep for later if Isaac wasn’t hungry when they got home, so they decided to buy sandwiches and pastries and coffee. When Stiles made a smiling comment about “balanced meals,” Malia also bought some fruit, though she stuck her tongue out at him first. It was so nice to be able to play with Stiles again.

When they walked through the door, they found Isaac sitting at the kitchen bar with his laptop and a bunch of books scattered around it. His face had been lined in concentration, but as soon as he saw the cups and bags they were holding, his expression transformed and his shoulders relaxed on a deep sigh.

“Is that coffee?” he asked Malia, even though they all knew he could smell it. “God, I could kiss you.”

“Or you could kiss Stiles,” said Malia. “He’s the one who said we should get you some.

“Yeah, you could kiss Stiles,” said Stiles, grinning at Isaac.

Isaac made an annoyed face at Stiles, but Malia could tell it was actually a fake-annoyed face, and his cheeks were a little pink. Isaac _didn’t_ kiss Stiles, because Stiles was busy taking their dinner over to the coffee table and getting glasses of water and plates for everyone. So Malia kissed Isaac instead, and rubbed at the knots in the muscles near his neck until he groaned in relief and leaned his head against her like he was exhausted and needed her body to prop him up.

“Come eat,” she said, and when it looked like Isaac was going to argue, she closed his laptop and his books, took his hand, and pulled him toward the couch until he sat down on the end that was closest to where Malia liked to sit on the floor. Stiles sat down next to them, and they began eating.

“Jesus, dude, did you skip lunch?” Stiles asked, and Malia had been wondering that too, because Isaac was eating really fast and more than usual.

“Maybe,” said Isaac, and picked up his glass of water. Malia noticed that after he took a sip and set it down, he shifted the way he was sitting slightly so that he was a little closer to Stiles.

“You have to eat if you want to be able to think clearly,” Malia said to Isaac, remembering a time when she’d been grumpy and Stiles had explained the word _hangry_ to her.

“Wise words,” Stiles agreed, and Malia saw that when he leaned in to grab a croissant, his shoulder and arm brushed against Isaac’s, and Isaac leaned into the contact.

Stupid boys. If they’d felt this way back in Beacon Hills, why hadn’t they admitted it then? It was silly to waste time arguing when you could be touching and kissing instead. Malia had never had a problem admitting how she’d felt about Stiles or Isaac, and it had worked out great!

“Well, my dad took all the food out of the freezer before he locked me in--”

“Oh my _God,_ ” Stiles cut in, and rolled his eyes before turning to Malia. “Is he _still_ making jokes about child abuse?”

Malia frowned. She had a dim memory of a conversation with Isaac, back when she’d first arrived, about “daddy issues.” She hadn’t thought much about it at the time because Isaac hadn’t seemed upset about it and she’d been focusing on her own feelings, and now she felt like a jerk for forgetting: _In case no one back home mentioned it, my dad used to hit me and lock me in a freezer_.

While she was still trying to think of how to respond, Isaac put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed it. The soft smile he gave her said he knew what she was thinking and it was okay. So she nuzzled his hand and smiled back.

“If we’re gonna play the Most Traumatic Adolescence Game, I’m gonna need a drink or something,” said Stiles, and though he was still kind of rolling his eyes at Isaac, Malia saw him move his hand to Isaac’s shoulder.

“Sure, Straight-A Stiles, the sheriff’s son, drinks,” Isaac said in a tone that Malia had slowly come to understand was _sarcasm_.

“Well, it’s legal for us here, isn’t it?” said Stiles. “So that’s different.”

“Isaac drinks wine,” said Malia. “It tastes gross.”

“Yeah, sour grapes don’t really appeal to me, either,” said Stiles.

“And Stiles would know something about sour grapes,” Isaac said with a smirk.

Clearly there was a joke there that Malia wasn’t getting, but she didn’t ask them to explain, because Stiles’s hand was on the back of Isaac’s neck, fingers playing with his hair, and Isaac’s hand was on Stiles’s knee, and Malia was starting to understand how saying something with touch and something different with words didn’t always mean lying.

* * *

ISAAC

It had been less than a day since they’d started… whatever it was that they had started, but Isaac was already cautiously letting himself get used to it.

Stiles and Malia bringing dinner home. Malia remembering to tell Stiles which coffee was Isaac’s favorite. Stiles doing the dishes while Isaac studied and Malia appropriated Isaac’s laptop and one of his notebooks. It was all surprisingly easy and frighteningly domestic.

Even later that evening, once Malia and Stiles had started arguing about sleeping arrangements, Isaac was happy to listen to them going back and forth between the bedrooms as Malia tried to determine which bed would be big enough for all three of them to share and Stiles insisted that the sleeping arrangements were fine how they had been the night before. Isaac could already tell who was going to win the fight, though. Malia had them both pretty whipped.

“Malia, I know you want all of us to sleep together now,” Stiles said from “his” bedroom, “but I’m telling you, it’s not going to be comfortable.”

“I used to sleep in a cave,” Malia’s voice came from the bedroom Isaac and Malia usually slept in together. “Trust me, beds are always comfortable.”

Stiles stuck his head out of the guest bedroom to glare at Isaac. 

“You’ve been a bad influence on her.”

Isaac kept his eyes on his book and continued pretending to study. “No idea what you mean. But as someone who used to sleep in a freezer--”

“Well now you’re just doing that because you know I hate it,” Stiles interrupted. Isaac waited to grin until Stiles had scowled and ducked back into the bedroom.

“What if we leave the doors open between the rooms?” Stiles called through the bathroom doors.

“But we’ll all fit in here!” It took almost no effort for Isaac to imagine Malia’s frustrated pout.

“Even if we do, we’re going to be sleeping on top of each other.”

“So?”

Isaac could _feel_ Stiles’s exasperation building in the brief silence. He had to press his knuckles to his mouth to stifle a laugh.

“So,” Stiles dragged the word out like he was gearing up for a rant. “What if one of us rolls over and makes someone else fall off? What if one of us has to get up in the middle of the night and wakes the other two up? What if _someone_ suffocates between two canine anthropomorphs?”

“If you don’t want to sleep with us, Stiles, just say so.”

Isaac took Malia’s tone as his cue.

“Malia, that isn’t what Stiles is saying,” said Isaac without shouting, as Malia’s hearing would pick up his voice from the bedroom without trouble.

“Then what?” Malia responded at a normal volume as well.

“What, what?” asked Stiles, who probably hadn’t heard Isaac chime in.

“Come out here and I’ll tell you,” Isaac said in a louder voice for Stiles’s benefit.

“Ugh! _Fine_.” Malia stomped out of the bedroom and sat down heavily beside Isaac on the couch. 

Stiles followed her out the door a few seconds later, glancing between Isaac and Malia. “This is going to be a thing, isn’t it?”

Isaac ignored him and looked at Malia.

“Stiles just wants us all to be able to sleep,” he explained.

Stiles nodded vehemently and spoke to Malia as well. “Dude’s got an exam tomorrow. He needs at least six uninterrupted hours, supernatural stamina or not.”

“Which is why I’m trying to figure out which bed is bigger,” Malia insisted, crossing her arms over her chest.

Malia had told Isaac before that she always slept better with another person (a list which Isaac was reasonably confident only included himself and Stiles) so it made sense that she’d want them both close. Still, Stiles had made good points about the potential for discomfort trying to squeeze them all into one of those beds. Isaac found himself torn. He did need sleep before his exam, and it seemed unlikely that he’d be able to share a bed with two people and not wake up at some point during the night. But he also knew Malia would have a hard time sleeping with one of their “pack members” in another room, which meant that either Isaac would be trying to sleep alone, or he’d be trying to sleep while sharing a bed with an anxious girl.

“Well, we’ve got two options: sleep apart or sleep together.” Isaac held up his hand to keep Malia from objecting while he continued. “Malia doesn’t want to sleep apart, and it sounds like the only objection to the second one is that we have to figure out how to make it work.”

“Which we can do tomorrow night when you don’t have a massive test you need to be well-rested for,” Stiles said firmly. “Caffeine doesn’t work on werewolves, remember? I’m trying to help you.”

Objectively, Stiles was right. Sleeping apart made sense, at least for tonight. But apart from upsetting Malia, it would also mean losing one of the only chances Isaac would have to sleep in a bed with the two of them together before they left. Something he very much wanted to do.

“Sorry, man, I’m with Malia,” Isaac said with a smirk, because he knew it would further irritate Stiles, and irritating Stiles was still one of his favorite things. “I’ve slept in _much_ worse places than a crowded bed.”

Stiles narrowed his eyes and glared at Isaac. 

“Fine,” Stiles said finally. “But I still have to sleep in the middle of the bed, so if someone falls, it’s gonna be you jerks.”

Isaac turned to Malia. “Sound fair to you?”

“Yep,” Malia grinned at Isaac before grabbing his hand. “So are you done studying yet?”

Isaac set the book aside and let her pull him up from the couch.

“Yeah, I’m probably as ready I’m gonna be for tomorrow.”

“Good,” she said, and started dragging him towards the bedroom.

Isaac caught Stiles’s fake scowl as Isaac was dragged past. “I guess we’re going to bed then,” Isaac called from the doorway.

It was nice being able to share his amused (and mostly feigned) resignation with Stiles, who simply rolled his eyes and said, “Last one in bed has to get the lights.”

* * *

STILES

At first, Stiles thought that it was _his_ alarm that was going off. It was the exact same annoying, generic phone alert that made Stiles swear every morning that someday he was going to remember to buy an actual alarm clock, after all. But unlike the previous morning, when waking up in Malia’s arms had made him think he was back home in Beacon Hills, this time the familiarity of the situation wasn’t enough to make Stiles forget where he really was: in a bed. In Paris. With Malia _and_ _Isaac_.

Isaac, who Stiles could feel leaning away to get to his phone on the nightstand. Stiles peeled his eyes open but couldn’t see much in the near darkness of the room, although he could tell when Isaac had grabbed his phone because the room was once again plunged into blissful silence, punctuated only by Malia’s slow, deep ~~snoring~~ breathing.

A second later, Isaac collapsed back against Stiles’s side with a groan.

Stiles couldn’t help but chuckle as his eyes slid back shut. The situation was surreal for so many reasons, but mostly because it was so _domestic_. Stiles would’ve thought that ending up in bed together with the two most attractive people he knew would likely start with sexytimes. But instead, Malia had set up their sleeping arrangements, made everyone brush their teeth, and arranged all of their various limbs so that no one would roll off the edge in the middle of the night. By silent agreement, both Stiles and Isaac had decided to change into boxers and T-shirts in separate rooms (whereas Malia was naked, as usual) before they’d all settled in under the blankets.

The bed shifted as Isaac rolled over and Stiles could tell even without opening his eyes that Isaac’s face was right in front of his.

“You’re on my pillow,” Stiles mumbled, causing Isaac to huff a soft laugh though his nose. 

“Oh, yeah?” Isaac scooted even closer to Stiles, which was not an easy feat considering how close they already were and the fact that Malia had Stiles wrapped up little-spoon style so her elbows and knees must have been a minefield for Isaac to navigate, but he managed to do it. “What are you going to do about it?”

“I’ll fight you, Lahey, don’t think I won’t.” If Stiles hadn’t been so tired, he might’ve even pretended to put some heat behind the words. “You’re lucky I didn’t bring my bat.”

The hand-- _Isaac’s hand_ \--that landed on Stiles’s waist was a searing heat, even through the blanket.

“I’m counting my blessings right now.” Those words, stripped of Isaac’s usual acerbic tone, did funny things to Stiles’s heart rate that Stiles desperately hoped Isaac hadn’t heard. He didn’t want Isaac to use that as an excuse to start up teasing him for real. Not yet. Stiles wanted at least another three minutes of sincerity if he could manage it.

So it was nice when Isaac’s only response was to bump his forehead gently against Stiles’s.

He didn’t know how long they stayed like that, just quietly breathing, ignoring morning breath because Stiles knew, they _both knew_ , that they were only going to have this for a little while.

“Do you _have_ to go?” Stiles eventually asked.

Isaac sighed and dragged his hand slowly up Stiles’s arm from elbow to shoulder, then back down, trailing his fingers in the small space where Malia’s forearm was tucked up against Stiles’s chest, with Stiles’s arm holding it there between his and Isaac’s bodies. The path of Isaac’s hand left goosebumps in its wake. In the sleepy dark, the touch was soothing and exciting at the same time.

“Sleep,” Isaac whispered. “I’ll be back before you know it.”

Then Isaac pulled away and the bed shifted again as he got up and out of bed, pulling the covers up close around Stiles in the space he’d left.

It should have been nice to have all that space back. They’d squeezed three people into a bed that was definitely not made for three people, and while it had been a little crowded, it had also been really nice to be that close with the two people he wanted near him more than anyone else.

Even asleep, Malia seemed to recognize Isaac’s absence. She whined for just a second before quieting again, nuzzling her face into the back of Stiles’s neck again, and Stiles realized it was because Isaac had circled around the bed to kiss her temple. Something he only figured out because Isaac did the same to him a second later.

Stiles’s last thought before he dozed back off was: _Whoever invented alarm clocks should be shot._

“Time to wake up, asshole. Malia’s getting bored.”

Turned out that Isaac had been right: by the time Stiles woke up again, Isaac was back from his exam. And insulting Stiles, as usual. Clearly, Isaac was in a good mood.

He was also holding a cup of coffee in front of Stiles’s face. The comforting smell of the bitter roast was almost enough to make Stiles forgive him. _Almost_.

Stiles made a half-blind grab for the cup, and it was a good thing that Isaac had werewolf reflexes and pulled the cup away in time or there would have been coffee all over the bed.

“Dick,” Stiles grumbled, sitting up and rubbing grit out of his sleepy eyes.

“So that’s the gratitude I get for not letting Malia wake you up, huh?” Isaac arched an eyebrow at Stiles. “She’s a coyote right now, by the way.”

Before Stiles had time to consider how little he wanted a hyperactive were-coyote jumping on the bed, Malia entered the room in human form, dressed in Isaac’s bathrobe.

“Liar,” Malia said as she took the coffee cup out of Isaac’s hand and placed it into Stiles’s. “Isaac doesn’t have to study today. That means we can do something together now, right?”

“Uh-huh,” Stiles agreed and took a long, grateful sip of coffee. His brain compartmentalized the words _do something_ as he let the small hit of caffeine and this mischievous look on Malia’s face drag his brain into wakefulness.

“Good,” she said cheerfully.

And before Stiles could realize what was happening, the coffee was being removed from his hand and he had a lap full of Malia. She turned to set the mug on the nightstand before looking up at Isaac and tugging at his shirt.

“Off,” she demanded. And Stiles watched in amazement at how quickly Isaac obeyed her without complaint. Surely if Stiles made a similar demand of Isaac, he’d be met with pushback and a bratty comment. Or maybe he wouldn’t. Or maybe he would, but it would be fun that Isaac was being bratty. Just the thought of having the guts to tell Isaac to take his clothes off was enough to make Stiles’s head spin.

Then everything in his head screeched to a halt as he was met with the very pleasing sight of Isaac without a shirt on. Which, objectively, wasn’t a new sight for Stiles. Apart from the locker rooms before and after lacrosse, there had been the ice bath. But now he’d _kissed_ Isaac, and slept all night pressed up against him. Context really was key.

It was only when Isaac’s knuckles gently knocked Stiles’s jaw back up so his teeth clicked together that Stiles realized his mouth had been hanging open.

“My eyes are up here, perv.”

Stiles flushed and his own eyes darted up to Isaac’s face. Yup, that was where his eyes were. His beautiful, piercing, wide-pupiled blue eyes. And his lips, quirked up in a knowing smirk. Stiles’s heart kicked and his stomach dropped.

Malia nuzzled her face beneath Stiles’s chin and slid her teeth against his jaw, causing him to shiver. Isaac’s smirk widened.

“I, uh.” Stiles cleared his throat, fingers fidgeting where they rested against Malia’s robe-clad waist. “I need to take my meds.”

“I’ll get ’em,” said Isaac, starting for the bathroom.

“No, no, that’s--” Stiles called after him, even as Malia leaped off of Stiles’s lap and raced Isaac toward the guest room.

Stiles rubbed at his face in exasperation. The “I need to take my meds” was true, but its silent subtext was “I need to brush my teeth before anyone kisses me again.” So despite their selflessness, Stiles got up and staggered toward the bathroom.

Neither of them teased him about brushing his teeth; Malia just set down Stiles’s bottle of Adderall on the bathroom counter, kissed his shoulder, and dragged Isaac back into “their” bedroom. After swallowing his pills, Stiles met his own eyes in the mirror and gave himself a silent pep-talk. _This is real. Yeah, it makes no fucking sense, but it’s not a dream. They’re here, and they’re waiting for you_.

So Stiles took another thirty seconds to splash some warm water on his face and scrub the rest of the sleep out of his eyes, took a deep breath, let it out, and went back to the bedroom.

…Where a naked Malia was straddling a shirtless Isaac.

Again, it wasn’t like Stiles wasn’t used to Malia being naked pretty much whenever she had the opportunity, but. Context.

Heart pounding, Stiles made his way back to the bed, standing next to it in his shirt and boxers, wondering what the hell to do next.

And then his traitorous stomach rumbled.

“Stiles didn’t get breakfast!” said a dismayed Malia.

“I’m fine,” said Stiles, because there was a stronger hunger in him demanding to be satisfied now. “I can wai--”

But Malia had already abandoned Isaac’s lap and was bounding toward he kitchen, leaving Isaac and Stiles giving each other exasperated “ _that_ _girl_ ” looks and trying not to laugh.

Then Isaac’s smile _shifted_ somehow, and, holding Stiles’s eyes, he moved toward the middle of the bed, making room next to him for Stiles. Despite his rising nervousness, Stiles crawled into the warm space Isaac had vacated. His brain kept searching for words and coming up empty. Alone with Isaac, for the first time since they’d kissed, it all suddenly began to feel unexpectedly serious.

For months, Stiles and Isaac had been playing with each other, dancing around an inexplicable attraction. But the look in Isaac’s eyes now, his stillness, revealed the terrifying truth: this wasn’t a game anymore.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac swallowed the lump in his throat, forcing himself to break eye contact with Stiles because it was too intense to process. He was so close to something he’d been longing for since he’d been a kid, and it scared the shit out of him. Yesterday, Isaac had almost convinced himself that being with Stiles would be as easy, as carefree, as being with Malia. But he’d known in his heart that this would be different. Because this was _Stiles_.

So close. He was _so close_. And Stiles was sliding closer to him inch by painful inch, slow and careful, so careful, to the point where Isaac didn’t know if Stiles was worried that Isaac was scared of him, or if Stiles was scared, too.

It was the thought that Stiles might be just as scared as Isaac that finally gave him the nerve to bridge the final few inches between them and press his lips to Stiles’s. Unlike yesterday, this kiss was unhurried, experimental. There was still a hunger beneath it, but it was the kind of hunger that was a deep ache rather than a ravenous need. This kiss was serious. It _meant_ something.

Which was why relief washed through Isaac when Malia reappeared wearing nothing but a proud smile and holding a plate with two slices of slightly burnt, overly buttered toast on it. And Isaac could tell by how quickly Stiles broke away from Isaac and took the plate that he was relieved, too.

Malia hopped onto the bed and back into Isaac’s lap, nuzzling little kisses against his throat to kill time while Stiles ate the toast and watched them with pink staining his cheeks. The hunger in Stiles’s eyes was ravenous again, and Isaac could handle that. He could play with Stiles like this and not worry about it meaning something. It was just the next step in a familiar game.

With Malia there, it felt so much less serious. It was as if having her to mediate their attraction allowed Isaac and Stiles to do and say things they’d never dared back home. Her presence reminded them that things were different now. Someone who knew each of them deeply, mind and body, thought it was natural for them to know each other that way, too. No one had given them that kind of permission in Beacon Hills. Certainly no one had ever given Isaac permission to do anything like this before, anyway.

It wasn’t until that moment that Isaac realized he’d been waiting for permission. It had only been a few years ago that Isaac’s life had been dominated by an unpredictable and unforgiving set of rules that someone with absolute power over him was hoping he’d break. “Don’t touch another boy that way” had never been an explicit rule, but Isaac had heard enough of his dad’s hateful comments to know it was an unspoken one, and that breaking it would carry heavy consequences. Hell, he’d been half convinced for years that that was the reason Matt had stopped hanging out with him, even though Matt had never been the boy toward whom Isaac’s eyes and thoughts had drifted.

As far as Isaac knew, his dad had died without discovering any evidence of Isaac’s _unnatural_ sexuality. He might have had his suspicions, but Isaac’s fear and self-loathing had kept him from pursuing any kind of romantic partnership with someone of any gender, and he was obsessive about hiding any indication that he watched or read porn, to the point where all of his browsers were still set up to clear his history when he closed them. He knew, objectively, that he was free now to break the rules. But that didn’t mean it was easy.

Thank God for Malia. She wouldn’t just tell Isaac he should break that unspoken rule; she _insisted_ on it. So when she pressed Isaac back against the pillows, Isaac went easily, and when she nudged Stiles toward Isaac, Isaac tangled his fingers in Stiles’s hair and proved that a kiss could be a fuck-you to a dead tyrant.

 _If my dad could see me now_ was a liberating thought flashing through Isaac’s brain as Stiles’s lips moved to Isaac’s neck and Malia’s took their place.

Isaac was shamelessly basking under the hands and lips and teeth of the two people who refused to let him follow the rules, when a rare but familiar tune chimed from his phone, which was sitting on the nightstand. His hand shot out toward it automatically.

The motion dislodged his worshipers. Malia gave a disappointed whine, and Stiles gave Isaac’s shoulder a little bite of admonishment that he’d clearly picked up from Malia.

“Really, dude?” Stiles said with a raised eyebrow. “You're gonna answer your phone _right now_? Why do you even have your ringer on?”

“I don’t,” said Isaac. “The only calls that ring on this phone are from Malia and Argent.”

“And since Malia’s here…” Stiles caught on, sitting up and eyeing Isaac’s phone with concern.

Chris wouldn’t call Isaac if it weren’t an emergency. They kept in touch now and then, but it was almost always through texts. It was understood that if one of them called the other one, the other one needed to pick up.

“Hey, Chris,” Isaac said after accepting the call. “What’s up?”

But the voice that responded didn’t belong to Chris Argent.

“Hello, Isaac,” said the Sheriff of Beacon County. “I’d like to speak with my son, please.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for reading and commenting! Apologies for the slightly late chapter; it's been a hectic week. We hope you enjoyed Stisaalia getting to know each other better.


	12. Après la pluie, le beau temps / After Rain Comes Sunshine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Stiles and Isaac get long-distance calls and no one dresses for the weather properly.

MALIA

“Hello, Isaac. I’d like to speak with my son, please.”

The words didn’t sound bad, but Malia could tell by the way Isaac’s scent had changed and his muscles had gone stiff that something was wrong. Her hearing was sharp enough that she recognized Stiles’s dad’s voice and didn’t see any reason why it should upset Isaac. The sheriff was a nice person. He had helped make sure she was safe after she’d turned human again, and she knew Stiles loved him. But Isaac’s heart was thudding like he was scared.

“What’s Argent saying?” Stiles asked Isaac.

Isaac didn’t answer, so Malia said, “It’s your dad.”

“My _dad_?” Now Stiles looked alarmed, if not as scared as Isaac. “Oh, fuck. _Fuck_.”

When Isaac handed his phone to Stiles, Stiles held it like it might burn him. He winced as he finally held it up to his ear.

“Heyyy, Dad,” he said.

“Why did I find out from Chris Argent that my son is in Paris? Last I heard, he was finishing up an internship and headed back home.”

Stiles’s eyes darted to Isaac’s. “I…”

“Y’know, I didn’t have a high opinion of the FBI based on my interactions with Raf McCall, but I did think it was very thoughtful of them to follow up on the _family emergency_ that one of their interns was suddenly dealing with.”

Isaac was warily watching Stiles’s face, which had gone pale. Then he jumped at the sound of Malia’s phone ringing. She picked it up from the bedside table. It was an American phone number. She held the screen up so Isaac could see, and he shook his head hard to tell her not to answer the call. But the timing was too close to Chris’s call for this to be random. She answered.

“Hey, kiddo,” said Chris. “I understand that Isaac’s phone is currently in use. Would you be kind enough to let him borrow yours for a minute?”

“Sure,” said Malia, even as Isaac was shaking his head harder. This was Chris’s apartment, and Isaac was staying here, too. It was only fair that he talk to Chris if Chris called. So she tossed her phone to Isaac, who was now pacing by the foot of the bed. He caught it and took a deep breath.

“Hey,” Isaac said into the phone, rubbing at the back of his neck while he continued to pace.

“Having a nice house party?” Chris asked Isaac.

Isaac flinched. “How’d you know he was here?”

“Building manager. I’m letting two teenage supernatural creatures live alone in my apartment in Paris. You think I’d leave you completely unsupervised? I know you’re technically adults, but I’m still responsible for you.”

“…I didn’t think about that,” said Isaac.

“Clearly,” said Chris. “I may have failed to mention that the Paris Argents own the building. My cousins are the kind of people who notice when werewolves with dog whistles are prowling around outside, or someone misses a spot on the banister when they’re cleaning blood off the stairs.”

Malia tried to shift part of her attention to Stiles’s call with his dad, though it was hard to keep track of both, especially when Isaac was getting more upset by the minute. Listening to the phone conversations, Malia was starting to feel bad, too. She didn’t want to make Chris or Stiles’s dad angry or worried. They were both nice to her and they cared about Isaac and Stiles.

“I hoped you’d call me if things got bad,” said Chris.

And then, almost immediately after, Stiles’s dad said, “When, exactly, were you planning on telling me? I tried to give you the benefit of the doubt. Figured your phone was off or your battery died. But it’s been _days_ , Stiles.”

“I’m sorry,” both Stiles and Isaac said at the same time. Both frowning, both… _distressed_. It made the coyote in Malia whine with the need to comfort them.

“I’m not going to ask you to come home,” said Stiles’s dad. “I recognize that you’re eighteen and I don’t have that right anymore. But Jesus, Stiles, you scared me half the death. At least send a text every once in a while.”

“I’m sorry, Dad,” Stiles repeated. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I just--”

“You just had a lot going on,” Stiles’s dad finished for him. There was a deep sigh. “Yeah, I figured.”

“We’ve got it handled,” said Isaac in answer to something Malia had missed.

“I sure hope so,” said Chris. “If I hear any more alarming news from my family, I’ll be asking them to step in. I suspect you’d rather I not do that.”

“Love you, too, Dad,” said Stiles. “I promise I’ll be better about keeping you in the loop.”

“We’ll be careful,” said Isaac. “I promise.”

And then everyone was saying goodbye, and the two phones were back on the bedside tables. Both Stiles and Isaac looked guilty and sad. Isaac looked even more than that. He looked… What was more anxious than distressed but also contained? Like Isaac was trying to push everything down but it was all bubbling up anyway. When Malia felt like that, she hid in her coyote form. But Isaac couldn’t do that.

Sensing that Isaac needed her more than Stiles did right then, Malia went to him, throwing herself into his arms and whining when he squeezed her back just a little too tight. She didn’t mind, she just held him tighter in return. 

He buried his face in her hair and whispered, “I’m fine, I’m fine,” but the way he said it sounded less like he was telling Malia and more like he was trying to make himself believe it.

“Fuck, Isaac, I’m so sorry,” said Stiles. “Between the jet-lag and getting sick, I didn’t even think…” Malia heard Stiles climb off the bed. He moved behind Isaac and Malia could feel that he’d started rubbing circles into Isaac’s back the way Malia did. Even though Malia didn’t like that Isaac was upset, it comforted her to see Stiles trying to comfort Isaac.

But Isaac wasn’t relaxing. If anything, he was more tense as he loosened their hug and carefully stepped out from between her and Stiles. He picked his shirt up off the floor and put it back on.

“I’m fine,” he repeated again, talking to them this time instead of himself. It was like he was trying to sound normal, but Malia could tell that something was still wrong. 

Malia frowned. She hated when people lied.

“Your dad just cares about you,” Isaac said to Stiles. “Makes sense he’d want to know where you are. And who you’re with.”

Now it was Stiles’s turn to frown. “He doesn’t care that I’m here, or that I’m here with you. He cares that I flew to a foreign country and didn’t tell him. I’d be mad at him too if he did that to me.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Isaac said quickly. “I, uh. I forgot something at school. I’m gonna go grab it before they close.”

And then he left the room. Malia looked to Stiles to see what he was going to do. Isaac was lying to them. He was leaving. Shouldn’t they go after him? But Stiles was just standing there, staring at the open bedroom door.

“Stiles?” she asked, hoping he might be able to help her understand what was happening.

“Let him go,” he said to her, eyes sad. He took her hand in his and squeezed it.

The front door to the apartment opened and closed. Footsteps in the hallway, on the stairs. Getting quieter. Then gone.

* * *

STILES

“Why are we letting him walk away?” Malia demanded. “He’s sad and he’s lying!”

“I know,” said Stiles. It didn’t take supernatural senses to figure that out. Even if Isaac hadn’t given the ridiculously transparent excuse that his school was supposedly going to close soon--Come on, Isaac, it was barely ten o’clock in the morning!--it would’ve been obvious.

Malia tugged at his hand, and Stiles let her drag him to the living room, but when they got to the front door, he maneuvered his body so that his back was up against the door, blocking her. She could get past him if she really wanted to, of course, but he hoped she wouldn’t try.

“I don’t understand,” she said, clearly anxious and bewildered. “Why did the phone calls make him so upset? I know we scared Chris and your dad but they’re not mad at Isaac, right? It sucked but it’s over now.”

“Nothing related to dads is ever going to be over for Isaac,” said Stiles.

Malia frowned. “What does that mean?”

Stiles winced internally. Had Isaac not told Malia about his dad? He searched his memory, trying to figure out if anyone had ever mentioned it in Malia’s presence. He’d forgotten how little Malia’s time in their friend circle had overlapped with Isaac’s, and none of them had talked about Isaac much after he’d left with Argent. Just like they never talked about Allison. Stiles wasn’t stupid; he knew that his friends hadn’t just been avoiding those names because they missed Allison and Isaac. It was because they didn’t want Stiles to feel guilty. Their efforts were wasted, of course, because he was never going to be able to forget what he’d done, but he appreciated the thought.

“Did he tell you what happened to him growing up?” Stiles asked delicately. “He made that freezer joke in front of you, so I figured maybe he did.”

Malia laced her fingers with Stiles’s, almost absently, while she made that adorable Thinking Face that Stiles had missed.

“When I first got here, I was mad at my dad for being too protective, and Isaac said we both had ‘daddy issues,’ and I said I didn’t understand, and he said his dad used to hit him and lock him in a freezer but I thought maybe he was joking or something.” Malia squeezed Stiles’s hand like it was a reflex. “I didn’t know him and I didn’t like him acting like we had the same problems.”

“That sounds about right,” said Stiles. Man, he would’ve paid money to see Stiles and Malia meet properly for the first time. Neither of them was exactly warm toward strangers.

“If he can make jokes about it, doesn’t that mean he’s okay now?” Malia’s question was so innocent it made Stiles’s heart hurt. Her genuine concern for Isaac was plain in her voice. She really liked him. Maybe _more_ than liked him.

“Actually, it kind of means the opposite,” said Stiles, tucking Malia’s hair back behind her ear. He hated seeing her upset.

Malia frowned, clearly even more confused than before.

“Basically,” Stiles continued, “he has to joke about it because he’s _not_ okay. Jokes are like… this stage between getting hurt and getting better.”

A pause, Malia considering the matter. She bit the bottom of her lip, then looked up at Stiles with wide, sad eyes. “What happened?”

The ethical thing to do would be to end the conversation here. Isaac had a right to privacy, and this was his story to tell, if he wanted to tell it at all. Maybe Isaac didn’t want Malia to know about his past. He’d flown thousands of miles to get away from it, after all.

But Isaac not explaining the situation to Malia had left her confused and hurt. From her perspective, Isaac had gotten upset about nothing and then left them instead of talking about it. Left them during a moment when they’d been on the precipice of something very special and important.

And Isaac had told her the basics. Maybe Stiles could just flesh out a few details, and then apologize to Isaac later. Malia looked so… lost. Stiles couldn’t just leave her like that.

“Okay,” said Stiles, “normally I’d say the right thing to do here would be to let Isaac tell his own story, but since he’s clearly not ready to talk about it, I’m just going to tell you what happened and he can be mad at me if he wants to.”

“Was it really that bad?” Malia nuzzled at Stiles’s shoulder, searching for comfort even before hearing the details.

Stiles took a deep breath and let it out, fingers “He told you his dad hit him and locked him in a freezer?”

Malia nodded against his shoulder.

“Did he tell you how many times, or for how long?”

There was a pause during which Malia thought, then shook her head.

“It was years,” said Stiles, because there was no point sugar-coating the truth when it came to Isaac. It would only complicate things and risk insulting Malia’s intelligence. “On a regular basis. Hitting, and then locking him in this freezer in the basement.”

When Malia looked up at Stiles, her face was filled with horror. Like even though her world was filled with literal monsters, she couldn’t imagine someone being that cruel.

“I don’t know how many times or how often,” Stiles rushed on, “but it wasn’t just one or a couple, you understand? That’s where the claustrophobia came from.”

“How…” Malia trailed off.

Stiles waited for her to find the words. He could see her grappling with the same emotions he felt when he thought about what had been done to Isaac.

“He was Isaac’s _dad._ How could he…” Malia’s look of horror transformed into a snarl of righteous fury. “I’m going to kill him.”

“You can’t.”

“Why not? He deserves it!”

“I agree,” said Stiles. Maybe two years ago he wouldn’t have meant that, just like he’d never really meant they should kill Derek or Jackson. But the Nogitsune had changed him. Hardened him. No one who did what Isaac’s dad had done to him deserved to live. Especially because it was Isaac. There were some things a person couldn’t un-see, and one of them was the look on Isaac’s face when Stiles had found him cowering under a motel room bed. “But Jackson beat you to it.”

“Jackson?”

“Long story,” said Stiles. “That part’s not important. What matters is that it left a mark inside him. Like a scar.”

“I understand trauma,” said Malia with a little half-eye-roll. “My therapist thinks I have it. PTSD. She says that’s why I have ‘violent outbursts.’ I wanted to explain about how that’s because I’m a coyote but Scott said she wouldn’t believe me.”

Stiles couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, I’m still working on what kind of metaphor I could use with a therapist to sum up the whole possessed-by-a-mass-murdering-chaos-demon thing. Man, the supernatural world could use a few good counselors, huh?”

Malia nuzzled at Stiles’s shoulder again. “You’re joking about your trauma, too.”

“Yeah,” said Siles. “I guess that’s part of why I ‘get’ Isaac. And why I know that if we push him on this he’s going to run away again.”

“I want to fix it,” Malia said almost sulkily.

“I know,” said Stiles, running his hand up and down her back to try to soothe her. “Me, too.”

“Can’t we go find him?” she asked, suddenly hopeful. “If we promise we won’t make him talk maybe he’ll come home and we can pretend nobody called and go back to how it was before. It was such a good day.”

Stiles considered that idea, appreciating again how much Malia clearly cared about Isaac. But that kind of plan wasn’t likely to work. “I think he might just need some time alone.”

“How much time?”

“I don’t know.”

“What about two hours?”

“Malia--”

“I’m not going to wait here all day when he’s sad,” Malia stubbornly insisted. “And besides, those other werewolves are out there, and we’re supposed to protect each other.”

Stiles inhaled a deep breath and sighed it out before conceding. The girl had a point. “Okay. We’ll wait two hours.”

“And if he isn’t home by then we’ll go find him?” she pressed. “I know his scent. There are a lot of scents in Paris but I think I can still track him.”

“Yeah,” said Stiles. “If he isn’t back in two hours, we’ll track him down and drag him home.”

The word _home_ reverberated in Stiles’s head, both a comforting promise and a terrifying prospect. _Home_ implied permanence and commitment. _Home_ was something Stiles had never really considered might be a possibility with Isaac. And Paris certainly wasn’t a long-term home for any of them, either together or separately. If Stiles allowed this thing that was starting among the three of them to become a kind of temporary home, what would happen when they weren’t living here anymore?

As if she could sense what he was thinking--well, given her supernatural senses, she could probably at least tell his mood--Malia made a coyote sound of comfort and tugged Stiles over to the couch and made him sit down. Then she came back with fresh clothes for him (he hadn’t had a chance to get dressed that morning because he’d been expecting to be undressed first) in the form of his thin sweatpants, a T-shirt, and boxers, as well as what looked to be one of Isaac’s T-shirts and a pair of his boxers for herself.

A little self-consciously (kind of an absurd thought given that less than an hour ago he’d been prepared to be fully naked and then some), Stiles changed clothes while Malia dressed, and then she ushered him back onto the couch and arranged their bodies so she was almost fully draped on top of him. Apparently she had brought her phone back with her, too, because he watched her set a timer for two hours and set it on the coffee table.

Stiles turned on the TV but didn’t bother to choose a channel. He just wanted some background noise while they waited. They didn’t fall back asleep, but they didn’t talk, either. They just stayed close to each other while they waited.

Waited to bring Isaac home.

* * *

ISAAC

 _Let him go_.

Stiles’s words followed Isaac down the stairs and out onto the street. He didn’t know where he was going, just that he had to get away Right Now.

 _Let him go_. As if they could have stopped him! Something childish and angry in Isaac wanted to turn and shout the words back at the building. But he didn’t. He kept walking.

He wished he’d thought to grab his jacket so he had something to do with his hands. He wanted to shove them into his pockets and hunch down and disappear. He wished he’d grabbed his scarf.

Isaac just felt so _stupid_. He’d let himself forget that they all had lives outside of Paris, that Stiles and Malia had families who actually gave a damn, that Isaac had responsibilities to Chris. What they were doing now--whatever they’d been trying to do before Isaac’s phone had rung--would have consequences.

Objectively, Isaac knew it wasn’t fair to be angry at Stiles or Malia for how he was behaving, or even Chris and the sheriff for calling. But he was. 

It was like hearing those voices from thousands of miles away had made what the three of them were doing together suddenly seem unsettlingly _real_. And though Isaac still had no expectation that whatever this was would turn into some kind of long-term thing, they’d all eventually be going back to the States, likely to Beacon Hills for a little while, at least until they each figured out the next steps in their lives. What would that mean for their _relationship_ , or whatever it was? Would Stiles or Malia even want Isaac if they weren’t in Paris? In this impossible city so far away from anything resembling real life?

Because any life where Isaac was happy couldn’t be real.

Isaac wanted nothing more right now than to go back to the apartment, drag Stiles and Malia back to bed, and lose himself in them. Even facing that tension between him and Stiles from earlier, the way every kiss and touch without Malia there had been terrifying, was preferable to the hard knot of angry guilt twisting in Isaac’s stomach.

Chris knew what was happening with the werewolves.

Isaac had thought he’d been so careful that morning with the bleach, wiping down the banisters and the doorknobs and shining his phone light on every step. To have been told that he’d missed something--and put Malia and Stiles at risk because of it!--had made Isaac realize that he was still that scared little kid who used to try to hide his report cards so his dad wouldn’t be disappointed in him. It hadn’t worked then either. Isaac was always going to be a screw-up.

The sooner Stiles and Malia figured that out and got away from him, the better.

Objectively, he knew that neither Chris nor the sheriff was actually angry with Isaac or Stiles. They were both just worried. But Isaac was starting to realize that he’d always be waiting for the next blow. He couldn’t help but react negatively to a stern father figure. And Isaac hated that his insistence that Stiles come to Paris had gotten Stiles in trouble with his dad. Isaac should’ve checked to make sure Stiles hadn’t dropped off the map when he’d been sick. It seemed like such an obvious oversight now. He’d just been so worried about Stiles at the time, and so confused about what he was feeling for him and Malia, that it hadn’t even occurred to him.

Isaac’s own dad was dead. He wasn’t supposed to have to worry about that kind of shit anymore. He didn’t have to check in with anyone. He was responsible for his own life. He wasn’t supposed to have to worry about disapproval or disappointment anymore. He didn’t have to be scared of basements and creaky stairs and small, dark places.

But he still was.

And Isaac didn’t want to be the reason Stiles was in trouble with his dad. He didn’t need that responsibility. Even though Isaac had been kissing the sheriff’s son and didn’t even know if Stiles was out to his dad yet, or ever wanted to be. Even though that hadn’t been what the call had been about.

He still felt guilty.

Fuck, he was so tired of fucking up other people’s lives.

And he wanted to teach kids?

His dad had been right. Isaac was a fucking moron.

And a coward. _I forgot something at school_. How fucking lame. Isaac hadn’t even been able to make up a good reason to leave. He’d just said the first stupid thing in his brain and fled rather than face Stiles after they’d both gotten off the phone.

Maybe if it had just been Malia, Isaac could’ve stayed and ignored what had just happened and lost himself in sex, but Stiles made everything so much more complicated.

He reminded Isaac of the person he’d been in Beacon Hills, back before werewolves and dead dads. Of liking a boy and knowing that he probably-- _definitely_ \--wasn’t supposed to, but as long as he never said anything or did anything outside of his own mind, he was safe from the consequences of that one forbidden feeling, even if he hadn’t been safe from other things.

Which made having that boy here, coming home to him asleep in Isaac’s bed, feel incredibly dangerous. Those feelings were supposed to have stayed hidden away, so they couldn’t be used to hurt Isaac. Isaac had trained himself to make sure Stiles--or at least the Stiles that Isaac kept in his head--was something no one else knew about. As long as he kept that secret, no one could take it from him.

So even though, of the two people Isaac wanted to sleep (or keep sleeping) with, Malia was objectively the far more dangerous one, Stiles would always be the one who scared Isaac. Malia was wild and reckless and let Isaac be wild and reckless with her. She pushed him and he pushed her, and before they’d realized it, they’d fallen hard. They were still falling.

Isaac had thought Malia’s recklessness was the danger. That was why he had called Stiles. He’d known in his gut that Stiles was the only person who could ground them. 

Isaac just hadn’t expected to be falling so fast when he hit the ground.

* * *

MALIA

Malia watched the time tick down on her phone screen, which she’d set on the couch next to Stiles’s head so she could see it while she lay on top of him.

She was mad that Stiles was making her wait, even though she understood why they were doing it. 

Isaac needed space. Fine. Malia could give him space.

Even though he’d never needed space from her before.

Stiles’s fingers were drumming restless patterns on her back, which just made Malia feel more restless. She knew from experience that Stiles wasn’t very good at waiting, either. Which probably meant that waiting was important this time.

Malia trusted Stiles and she knew that he only wanted what was best for Isaac, and since Malia also only wanted what was best for Isaac, she was willing to listen to Stiles, even though she still thought he was wrong.

Pack wasn’t supposed to leave each other behind. 

And Malia realized what had been bothering her. Why she’d been so mad for so long. She’d thought it had been Stiles’s fault, and it had been, a little, but it had also been hers.

“I left you,” she admitted, just barely loud enough to be heard over the TV. She only knew he’d heard her at all because his fingers stopped tapping. “I said I wouldn’t, but I did.”

 _I would never leave you behind_ , Malia had said, back in Beacon Hills, not so long ago. And it hurt to suddenly realize then that she’d broken her promise. She’d left Stiles, first to go after her mother, then to come here.

With her head pillowed on Stiles’s chest, she felt when he lifted his head to look at her. She shifted so that she could look back.

“Hey.” Stiles’s grip on her back tightened a little. “It’s okay. None of what happened is your fault.”

Malia shook her head and tried to sit up, but Stiles just wrapped his arms tighter around her, not letting her go. 

“Not your fault,” Stiles repeated. “Okay?”

Malia wanted to argue, to take some of the blame, but she knew Stiles would never agree. So instead, she said, “No more running,” and let him pull her back down against him.

“No more running,” Stiles agreed.

“That means Isaac, too,” she insisted. 

Stiles agreed again, but he didn’t sound as sure anymore. Probably because he didn’t want to make promises for Isaac. That was okay for now, though. As soon as they went to get him, Malia would make Isaac promise, too.

She looked back at her phone. It had almost been two hours. That was probably close enough, right? She wanted to ask Stiles, but she already knew what he would say.

Which was why she was surprised when not even ten seconds later Stiles said, “We could probably start getting ready to go.”

Maybe Stiles was just as impatient as she was to go after Isaac, despite what he’d said before. The thought almost made Malia smile, even though she was still more worried than happy. She just liked that Stiles agreed with her about how Isaac should be with them.

“Finally!” Malia squirmed out of Stiles’s arms so she could get up. She grabbed her phone and cancelled the timer as she went to find some kind of bottom clothing that people said was okay for outside (even though she didn’t see why shorts were different from boxers). She didn’t want Stiles to change his mind.

When Stiles met back up with Malia in the living room he was wearing jeans and a hoodie.

“Not that I don’t think you look good in those shorts, because you really, _really_ do,” said Stiles, eyes wandering from her toes up to her waist, “but, uh, it’s pretty cold out.”

Malia shrugged. “I like them.” But Stiles did have a point about how it might be a little cold, so she borrowed one of his flannel shirts from his suitcase (because the one she’d brought with her didn’t smell enough like him anymore) and pulled it on over Isaac’s shirt. Then she found one of Isaac’s scarves in the coat closet and wrapped it around Stiles’s neck while he was putting on his shoes. Malia didn’t like being cold, but it wasn’t as dangerous for her as it was for humans, and she was _not_ going to let Stiles get sick again.

“Come on, Stiles,” she whined. It only took her a few seconds to pull her boots on and Stiles was still tying his shoelaces.

“You can track without shifting, right?” Stiles asked her as he _finally_ stood up again. “Because I’m not sure you look enough like a dog to--”

“Yeah, yeah,” Malia said impatiently. “Isaac already told me. It’s a little harder if I don’t shift, but I can do it.”

Stiles snorted. “Good to know he’s got _some_ sense. Not enough to bring a jacket, though, I bet.”

That was a good point. Malia rushed back to the coat closet and grabbed one of Isaac’s jackets. Isaac could handle the cold better than Stiles could, but she still wanted him to be warm.

“Come on,” she repeated, “let’s go!”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming,” said Stiles. He sounded irritated, but Malia knew he was just playing. He took Isaac’s jacket from her and kissed her on the cheek. “Lead the way, bloodhound.”

Malia stuck her tongue out at Stiles for that, but she also kissed the back of his hand after she grabbed it in hers, and then she tugged him down the stairs after her.

The sooner they found Isaac, the sooner things would be how they were supposed to be again.

* * *

ISAAC

It must have been hours, but Isaac had only managed to walk about three blocks in any direction. Without even meaning to, he’d ended up circling the apartment building over and over, which just made him think about that werewolf pack and what he’d told Chris.

_We’ve got it handled._

Did they really? All Stiles had done since getting there was fight off a flu and fall into bed with Isaac and Malia. He was supposed to take Malia away. That was the only way Isaac had been able to see this situation deescalating.

There had been several reasons that Isaac hadn’t wanted to get Chris involved, but they all felt trivial now that Isaac knew he was living in an apartment owned and managed by hunters. That, more than anything, was probably the reason that the werewolf pack hadn’t found them already. Or, as was seeming more likely the more he thought about it, the reason the other werewolves had avoided their building.

Isaac really was an idiot.

But now that thought was making him less angry and guilty and more… _tired_. 

He was self-aware enough to admit--if only to himself--that he’d left the apartment like that because he was scared. Scared of disappointing Chris, scared of ruining Stiles’s relationship with his dad, scared of not being good enough for Malia… And when Isaac was scared, he got angry, and when he got angry, he ran. Because the alternative was usually hurting someone who didn’t deserve it, and Isaac refused to be any more like his dad than he already was. 

Isaac might be a werewolf, but he refused to be a monster.

 _Let him go_.

Stiles’s last words before Isaac had left the apartment were just making Isaac sad now, rather than angry. Because he could see that Stiles had just been trying to give him space.

It was almost funny for Isaac to think about, considering everything, but Stiles probably knew Isaac much better than Isaac wanted him to. They’d grown up in the same small town, after all. Gone to the same schools, had the same teachers. They’d practically lived in each other’s pockets for those first few months after Isaac had first become a werewolf and their lives had all gone to shit. Stiles might not have been watching Isaac as closely as Isaac had been watching Stiles, but Stiles wasn’t stupid. He knew what Isaac had been through. He knew where Isaac came from. That was more than Isaac could say about a lot of people he’d grown up with.

That thought should’ve scared Isaac. He’d literally fled the country to get away from people who’d known him, and now here Isaac was, inviting someone back in who’d literally watched him live though the worst of it. He was undoing all of the hard work he’d done since he’d arrived in Paris to become someone new, to belong somewhere else. To leave Beacon Hills behind, the bad and the good.

Stiles had to know what a fuck-up Isaac was, how badly Isaac could ruin Stiles’s life, and yet he’d still dropped everything to come to Paris when Isaac had called. Isaac had tried to tell himself that it was just for Malia, tried to be okay with the idea that Stiles still loved Malia and there was no place for Isaac with either one of them. But then Stiles and Malia had shown Isaac how untrue all of those things he’d been telling himself were, and that was what scared Isaac most of all. Because if Isaac really was like his dad, he was going to ruin every good thing he ever touched. 

And Isaac was so tired of breaking things. He was tired of letting his dad’s ghost haunt his every step. Of always worrying about the parts of himself and his past that he couldn’t change. He didn’t want to let his own fear or anger or exhaustion keep him from being with the two people that actually made him happy. But he also didn’t want to make them unhappy in the process.

Isaac stopped walking when he realized he was outside the apartment building. He hadn’t even realized when he’d turned around to go back. He tried to make himself walk a few steps closer to the door, to go inside and apologize to Stiles and Malia for just leaving like that, but suddenly his feet didn’t seem to want to work anymore.

Malia was probably going to be mad at him. There was no way she would’ve understood why he’d left, even if Stiles did. She was going to expect him to be able to explain it, and even thinking about doing that felt even more impossible than entering that apartment again. If she tried to get him to talk, he’d either have to tell her the truth--which he couldn’t handle dealing with right now--or lie to or ignore her--which would hurt her and make her angrier.

The air smelled like rain. Isaac was only just noticing how overcast the sky had gotten. It would be so easy to get safely inside before the storm started, but Isaac still couldn’t seem to make himself walk the rest of the way down the block to the building entrance.

Part of Isaac wondered if he was really masochistic enough to stand outside in the freezing Parisian rain if it started rather than go inside to be with people who actually seemed to care about him for some reason, while the other part of him absolutely knew that he was. Causing himself pain was basically a reflex for Isaac, and pain was easier than conflict.

Isaac was going to end up standing in the rain all day, ten feet away from something resembling happiness, and wouldn’t that that just be a perfect metaphor for his life?

The sound of a heavy wooden door closing drew Isaac out of his thoughts and made his eyes dart automatically in the direction of the noise. And there they were, standing together in front of the main door to the apartment building.

They didn’t see him at first. Malia was wearing Isaac’s favorite T-shirt under one of Stiles’s flannels, which he was trying to help her button up at least partially, presumably to compensate for the fact that she was wearing those impractically short shorts yet again in spite of the cold. Stiles had one of Isaac’s scarves wrapped loosely around his neck. The scarf Isaac had wrapped around Malia just before their first kiss. He was holding Isaac’s jacket.

A fierce, joyful kind of possessiveness clenched around Isaac’s heart, shoving down his self-pity. He was still not okay. He might not ever really be okay. And he would be even less okay when they were gone. But for now they were here, and they were _his_ , and he wouldn’t let his past make him waste another minute he could be spending with them.

When Malia caught sight of Isaac, her face lit up with relief and she ran up to him, practically flinging herself into his arms.

“You’re back,” she said with open happiness, nuzzling her face against his collarbone. “I was going to track you but you came back.”

Isaac didn’t know how to tell them that he’d barely left, so he didn’t.

“Promise you won’t do that again,” Malia demanded, giving him a very stern look all of a sudden. “You’ll never leave us behind again, okay? _Promise_.”

“I promise,” he said to Malia, meeting her eyes to show her he was serious.

It was an easy promise to make, because with Malia in his arms again and Stiles nearby, Isaac knew with absolute certainty that he’d never be strong enough to leave them. No matter how scared or angry, he’d cling to this. But he didn’t promise not to let them go. And he didn’t promise to go with them if they wanted to leave. Because he wasn’t going to lie to Malia ever again.

He glanced up at Stiles, who was walking towards them at a more reasonable pace.

“Thought you might need this,” said Stiles, offering up Isaac’s jacket. His lips were slightly turned up in a cautious half-smile, like he was trying to be friendly but didn’t know how Isaac would react to it.

“Thanks,” said Isaac. As Isaac shrugged into his jacket, Stiles’s hands went to unwrap the scarf from around his neck, but Isaac covered Stiles’s hand with his own to stop him.

“Keep it on,” said Isaac. “Looks better on you.”

“You’ve told your share of lies today, Lahey, but that one’s definitely the biggest.”

“Okay, so it looks better on me,” said Isaac. “Wear it anyway.”

If Isaac had had the guts to kiss a boy in the middle of a crowded street, the smile on Stiles’s face would’ve made him kiss him then. He could wait, though. Even if he’d had the guts, he wasn’t sure he was ready to share what he and Stiles had with anyone but Malia.

Sometimes it was nice to have something that no one else knew about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much for reading and commenting! A little late again, as life continues to be hectic. We're very gratified by how many of you seem to be enjoying our Malia. We think she's a gift and deserves only good things!


	13. À raconter ses maux, souvent on les soulage / A Problem Shared Is a Problem Halved

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Malia and Stiles help Isaac forget about those phone calls.

MALIA

Malia liked the rain. She liked how it made everything smell and how it made the woods louder and cities quieter. It was one of the few things she liked better as a human than as a coyote. Skin dried a lot faster than fur.

When the three of them got home, the first thing Malia did was start tugging at Isaac’s wet jacket. It hadn’t been raining super hard on their walk back to and from lunch, but it was still enough to soak into their hair and the outer layers of their clothing. Malia was glad she’d made Stiles wear Isaac’s scarf and they’d thought to bring his jacket rather than the warmer coat that didn’t have a hood and wasn’t supposed to get too wet. Though she’d never admit it, Malia had also been thinking by the end of the walk that maybe wearing her favorite shorts hadn’t been the smartest decision after all.

“Off,” she ordered.

At first Malia thought Isaac was going to tease her for being bossy. Malia knew she’d barely let go of him the whole time they’d been out getting lunch. Lydia had tried explaining to her once about not being “clingy,” but Malia couldn’t help it. It wasn’t that she was worried about Isaac leaving her and Stiles again; it was just nice to have him close. Especially with everything Stiles had told her before they’d gone to find him. 

It might have been silly, but Malia needed Isaac to know that she was there for him. She didn’t want him to ever feel so scared that he wanted to run away from her. She was supposed to protect him. She couldn’t go back in time and kill the man who had hurt Isaac before she’d known him (her coyote growled its anger inside her), but she could make sure no one ever had the chance to do anything like that to him again. Even if that made people think she was bossy or _clingy_.

Isaac didn’t tease her, though. He just let her tug off his jacket, making a weird face and laughing when the wet sleeves stuck to his skin and turned inside out. 

They struggled for a few seconds before his jacket hit the floor with a wet slap, followed quickly by the T-shirt he was wearing and the flannel Malia had borrowed from Stiles.

“That’s my favorite shirt,” said Isaac about the one Malia had put on under the flannel. He sounded like he was scolding her, but he was also smiling. He looked at the letters on the front for a few seconds before he helped her slip out of it. 

“I know,” said Malia. “That’s why your scent is so strong on it.”

“Were you gonna track me with it?”

Malia shook her head. “I know your scent enough to track you already. I just wanted to smell like you.”

Isaac’s smile turned soft, and he leaned in and kissed her. His bare chest felt nice against hers even though his skin was a little chilled. She didn’t mind that his fingers were cold when they squeezed her hip.

An amused huff made Malia look over at Stiles, who had already taken off his shoes, Isaac’s scarf, and the jacket he’d been wearing, and was peeling off his socks. 

“Exhibitionists,” Stiles muttered as he bent over to pick up the clothes that Malia had dropped on the floor. “Making out topless while ‘the help’ cleans up after your mess.”

“No one had a problem with us leaving clothes on the floor until you got here,” Isaac said with a teasing smile. Malia gave his jaw a scolding nip because Stiles was doing something nice for them.

“No wonder Malia keeps stealing our clothes if this is what happens to them when you guys get home,” said Stiles. But he let Malia add Isaac’s T-shirt to the wet bundle in his hands before saying, “I’m gonna go hang these up to dry in the bathroom. You know where to find me when you come up for air.”

Malia was aware of Stiles leaving the room, but she wanted to finish with the rest of their clothes before going after him. So she let Isaac toe off his shoes before she reached for the button of his jeans and pushed them down his hips. He stopped her hands when she went for his boxers.

“Not yet,” he said, and since the tone of his voice was unexpectedly serious, Malia didn’t push him. At least he was naked enough that she could help him warm up. 

Isaac knelt down to undo the laces on her boots. She used his shoulder to balance as he tugged one off, then the other, then both of her still mostly dry socks. 

“Someday you’re going to realize how stupid clothes are,” said Malia, kicking off her shorts and the boxers she was wearing underneath them.

“But if we didn’t wear them then we couldn’t have fun taking them off.” Isaac was teasing her now, after all, but as Malia searched for something clever to say, he yawned. She’d forgotten how early Isaac had gotten up and everything he’d been through that day.

“Nap time,” Malia announced, and grabbed Isaac’s arm.

“Nap time?” asked Isaac, resisting only long enough to collect the rest of their wet clothes as she pulled him to his feet and towards their den.

Malia didn’t know how Isaac could get by on so little sleep. He was always awake before her for school and he never had time for naps. Sometimes they stayed up really late having sex, and even though Malia tried to make sure they didn’t on school nights, they still did.

She walked Isaac over to the foot of their bed and gently pushed at his shoulders until he sat down.

“Stay,” she said with a small growl to assert dominance. Isaac nodded, wearing an amused smile. Malia decided that she didn’t care if Isaac thought she was silly as long as he listened to her.

She took the wet clothes from Isaac and turned towards the bathroom, almost running into Stiles coming out. He’d already changed into sweatpants and was toweling off his hair. It looked like Stiles was being weird about nakedness, too, but at least neither he nor Isaac had shirts now like they’d worn the previous night, so they were making progress.

“Trade you,” said Stiles, offering her the towel. She gave him the rest of the wet clothes in return and started scrubbing the towel over her head with both hands.

“You’re gonna get dreads if you keep doing that,” Isaac said from across the room with a kind of snort that usually meant he thought something was funny but not the kind of funny to laugh at properly.

“I always dry my hair like this.”

“That explains a lot,” said Stiles, coming out of the bathroom behind her.

“Shut up,” Malia said to him, but she made sure he could see her smiling as she threw the towel at him so he would know she wasn’t being mean.

Stiles caught it, laughing, and stepped up to Malia. He kissed her and used the towel to wring out the tips of her hair. She batted him away and started combing her fingers through her hair, looking for knots as Stiles walked over to Isaac. He reached for the towel, but instead of handing it to him, Stiles dropped it on Isaac’s head and started gently drying his hair.

“Thanks,” Isaac whispered when Stiles was done and had pulled the towel away.

There was a strange pause where Stiles didn’t respond, and Malia tried to watch them without being obvious. It wasn’t like either Isaac or Stiles to be shy, but for some reason they still were with each other sometimes. Malia wanted them to treat each other like they treated her, but she also didn’t want to push them.

“Yeah, well, you were gonna get the pillows all wet otherwise,” Stiles finally said, “and you’re probably gonna steal mine again.”

“You think you’re invited to the nap party, huh?” said Isaac. “Even after you slept half the day?”

“What can I say?” Stiles shrugged. “You’re exhausting.”

Isaac opened his mouth, but another yawn came out instead of a response to Stiles. Malia decided the boys had done enough play-fighting for now.

“I said nap time,” she insisted as she walked back toward the bed. She nudged Isaac’s shoulder to get him to move. “I’m tired and cold.”

Isaac gave Malia a fake-annoyed look, but he obeyed her and crawled farther up on the bed. Normally, Stiles should go in the middle. But the coyote in Malia wanted to make sure Isaac couldn’t sneak away again, and they weren’t sleeping all night, so Stiles would probably be okay. Stiles seemed to agree with her, because after he’d gone to hang up the towel and came back to find that Malia gotten Isaac to lie down, Stiles nudged him toward the middle and crawled into bed next to him on the opposite side from Malia.

The coyote finally settled inside Malia. Her fierce werewolf and her funny human boy were both back in their den with her where she could keep them safe. Now they had all afternoon to get warm again and rest up before she pounced them and reminded them of what they’d been planning to do before those stupid phone calls had interrupted them.

* * *

ISAAC

They hadn’t made him talk about it. All through their walk to lunch, and during lunch, and on the way back, Isaac had been so afraid Stiles, or Malia, or both of them would try to get him to explain. And he wouldn’t have been able to bear that. Definitely not right now, and probably not for a long time.

Isaac could live with the fact that Stiles knew the basic events surrounding what Isaac’s dad had done to him, and Isaac had hinted at the big stuff to Malia in the form of the half-jokes that he used as armor. But Isaac didn’t want the fragile beginnings of this strange bond they were forming to be tainted by all of that ugliness. Even if confronting it was probably healthier, Isaac wasn’t ready to do the healthy thing.

So he had been relieved to the point of gratitude when Malia had demanded that they take a nap together. The emotional rollercoaster of the past couple of hours, combined with walking around in the cold--and not dressed warmly enough for the first part of the walk--had left Isaac in dire need of a physical and emotional reset. He wanted to put as much distance as possible between the phone calls and the intimacy that they’d been on the edge of just before them.

It was a sign of just how drained Isaac was that skin-to-skin contact with Stiles was comforting rather than exciting. Well, not that it _wasn’t_ exciting, just that the thing Isaac’s body craved most from Stiles in that moment wasn’t sex. Isaac had waited a long time for that, and he still desperately wanted it. But he’d waited even longer for this: just being close to Stiles. Being quiet with him. Finally, Stiles wanted to be with Isaac. So Isaac was content, for now, just to be.

* * *

STILES

Stiles couldn’t sleep, but for once, he was okay with that. Unlike Isaac, he hadn’t been through an emotional crisis that morning, and unlike Malia, he didn’t need to sleep ten hours a day. But though Malia hadn’t said anything, Stiles knew her well enough to know that this was a moment where he was supposed to help her “protect” Isaac, to make sure he didn’t leave them again.

It wasn’t exactly a burden, though, to mirror Malia in pressing up against Isaac’s side and throwing an arm over his chest. Isaac’s skin was smooth and slowly warming after the rain had chilled it. It had taken only a few minutes for both Malia and Isaac to fall asleep, after which point Stiles carefully lifted his head so he could see both their faces, so he could marvel at how two such powerful people--people who sometimes literally snarled at him and had sharp fangs and claws--could look so… _soft_.

Stiles lifted his arm to brush Malia’s hair behind her ear. She emitted a sleepy sigh and nuzzled her face against Isaac’s shoulder, snuggling deeper into the blankets. A small smile tugged up the corner of Stiles’s mouth. For symmetry, Stiles smoothed Isaac’s rain-fluffy hair away from his forehead. Then he laid his head back down next to Isaac’s, rested his arm below Malia’s across Isaac’s chest, and settled in to let a couple of sleeping dogs lie.

* * *

MALIA

Malia knew Stiles had been awake before her, because his hand found hers while she was stretching out her arms to shake the sleep from her muscles. His long fingers twined with hers, and when she opened her eyes he was leaning up over Isaac so he could see her face. He smiled, and he was so beautiful. Both of them were. And Malia could look at them as much as she wanted.

“Hi,” Stiles whispered, probably so he wouldn’t wake Isaac up. But Isaac had napped long enough, so Malia didn’t bother trying not to disturb him as she sat up and tugged Stiles’s hand so he’d move closer. When he did, she kissed him, and it was suddenly very annoying to Malia that Isaac wasn’t awake, because she knew that Isaac liked watching her and Stiles kiss. So when she was done kissing Stiles she ducked her head and pressed her lips to Isaac’s.

Just like in that movie she remembered watching when she was really young, before she’d known she was a coyote, Malia’s kiss made Isaac wake up. His beautiful blue eyes were foggy for a few seconds as he blinked sleep away, and then they met Malia’s and he smiled.

“I’m bored,” Malia complained. Not because she was _actually_ bored, but because when she said she was bored it made Isaac tease her and Stiles give her attention.

“‘Bored,’ she says.” Stiles’s tone was serious, but Malia could tell he was trying not to smile. “ _Bored_ , like she doesn’t have two half-naked guys in bed with her.”

“In her defense,” Isaac said on a yawn, “she’s an all-naked girl. We’re lagging behind.”

“Exactly,” said Malia, delighted that Isaac was playing with her. She rewarded him with another kiss, which this time he leaned up into, resting his hand at the back of her neck to keep her from pulling back.

A dramatic groan signaled that Stiles was watching them, and Malia felt Isaac’s huff of amusement against her cheek.

“I’m not gonna survive this,” Stiles said when Malia and Isaac broke apart and looked over at him. “Enjoy me now, ’cause this might be your only chance.”

“That’s the plan,” said Isaac. Stiles’s pulse jumped and his cheeks turned red, which made Isaac laugh. Malia’s coyote danced around inside her because her boys were playing with each other without using mean words.

“The plan, huh?” Stiles looked to Malia. “You in on this?”

Understanding that this was a game, and so it was okay to make a joke instead of telling the truth, Malia said in a serious voice, “We had a meeting about it.”

This made Isaac laugh harder, and it was so wonderful to hear him laugh. Isaac wasn’t sad all the time or anything, but he didn’t laugh a lot. Malia decided she would try to make Isaac laugh more from now on.

“You guys got a spreadsheet or something?” Stiles asked.

“More like a diagram,” Isaac said after he’d gotten his laughter under control.

“Color-coded,” said Malia.

“With step-by-step directions,” Isaac added.

“Well, now you’re making it sound like you’re putting together a piece of furniture,” said Stiles.

Seeing an opportunity for cleverness, Malia shook her head and said, “No, we’re going to take you apart.”

Malia knew she’d succeeded at surprising them when even Isaac’s cheeks turned pink, and neither one of them said anything right away.

“Well, uh…” Stiles swallowed. “I wouldn’t want to get in the way of the plan.”

“Smart,” said Isaac. “Malia, you’ve got the first step.”

There were no actual steps, of course, because it was a game, but Malia understood that Isaac was telling her to make the first move, and Malia had no problem with that. It had been a long time since Malia and Stiles had had sex, and, all of a sudden, that fact was unacceptable to Malia.

Isaac stayed still and watched while Malia climbed over him and made Stiles shift up so she could settle in his lap. It was very annoying that neither Stiles nor Isaac was naked yet, but she’d fix that soon.

There was no need for talking in their game now. Talking would get in the way of kissing, and all of them wanted to do that. So Malia kissed Stiles, again and again, until he was sitting up and pulling her closer in his lap. The fact that he was wearing pants was becoming even more annoying.

The feeling of Isaac’s lips on her neck made Malia _slightly_ less annoyed. The coyote in her wouldn’t normally trust anyone’s teeth near her throat, because that was a point of vulnerability, but it trusted Isaac and Stiles there. Which was good, because Malia really liked the way it felt, and she didn’t want to have to fight her coyote instincts about it.

Malia made a noise of surprise when Isaac pulled her off Stiles and tumbled her onto her back, pinning her to the bed. His grip on her wrists was loose enough that she could get away if she wanted to, but she decided she would let Isaac “win” for a minute or two. Still, she snapped her teeth at him to remind him of her strength.

“Damn,” said Stiles from beside them. Both Malia and Isaac looked at him.

“What?” Malia asked.

“I, uh.” Stiles shrugged kind of awkwardly, and Malia’s brain said _cute_ because his hair was all fluffy from how she’d grabbed it while kissing him, and his lips and cheeks were pink. “I just keep forgetting about how the whole supernatural creature agility thing factors into sex.”

Isaac smirked. “Hey, you’re the one who said you weren’t going to survive this.”

“You have to be gentle with him,” Malia said to Isaac, suddenly worried that maybe Isaac didn’t understand about sex with humans. She’d never asked him about who else he’d had sex with.

“Hey, I’m a reasonably strong human,” Stiles objected, “not a Faberge egg.”

Malia didn’t know the word _Faberge_ , but she figured it was something fragile based on the rest of Stiles’s sentence.

“So you don’t want us to hold back at all?” Isaac asked him. One of his eyebrows was raised, almost like a challenge.

Stiles hesitated, looking a little nervous. Malia frowned and was about to scold Isaac for scaring Stiles, but then Isaac leaned his head down so his face was right next to her ear and whispered, “You know I’d never hurt him.”

“Hey, what’re you whispering about?” Stiles asked. “Not cool, man.”

Reassured that Isaac wasn’t actually trying to scare Stiles, Malia said, “It’s about the plan.”

Stiles looked like he was going to keep talking, but Isaac freed one of Malia’s hands and tugged at Stiles’s shoulder until Stiles shifted down to settle next to Malia.

“Less talk,” said Isaac. And Stiles must’ve understood that to mean “more kissing,” because he kissed Malia again.

After that, there was no more talking for a long time. Like when she’d had to make Stiles and Isaac talk to each other about their feelings, Malia did have to nudge them together a few times. It seemed like there was a little of that same shyness from before, but there was also something… _wary_ , that was the right word. Something wary in the way Isaac and Stiles were behaving with each other now. Like two predators trying to figure out if the other one was a threat because neither of them wanted to fight but they also didn’t want to get attacked.

The wariness was the strongest when Malia got impatient about them still wearing clothes and made them both _finally_ get naked. Malia had to remind herself that both of them still had human ideas about nakedness, and it was a bigger deal for them to see each other like that than it had been for Malia to be naked with either of them for the first time. Since Malia cared about Isaac and Stiles, she wanted to respect that just because she thought something shouldn’t be important didn’t mean it wasn’t important to them. Even though it was silly. 

In any case, the wariness would go away as they did this more. What mattered was that they were all together now. Isaac and Stiles would get more comfortable with each other soon, and they could all feel good and have fun and be happy. Things were finally starting to come together. Malia had both boys she loved, and she wasn’t letting them go.

* * *

STILES

Okay, what even was Stiles’s life.

The healthy course of action would’ve been to not let Isaac compartmentalize or use sex as a form of escapism. The healthy course of action would’ve been to have a nap, chill around the house, eat dinner, and get to bed at a reasonable hour. But Stiles kind of didn’t give a shit about what was healthy right now. Because he wanted to compartmentalize, too. He wanted to ignore the future and the past and just lose himself in the miracle of these two people both wanting him. 

The chaos in Stiles’s head had never gone away completely, but when faced with the fierceness of a wolf and a coyote, the lingering echoes of the fox cowered and slinked back into the shadowy corners of his mind. Maybe “let’s let our respective demons duke it out” wasn’t the best long-term strategy for dealing with trauma, but right now, Stiles didn’t know whether they’d have a long term at all. He didn’t know whether he’d be able to keep both or even one of them. What he did know was that he had them both now.

So Stiles savored every moment of contact, letting his hands and his mouth remember Malia’s body, and he dared to learn some of Isaac’s body as well, Malia’s presence easing his nervousness and lending him courage. He drank both of them in, greedy to claim new knowledge and reclaim precious memories. Stiles was shameless in his hunger for them, and he didn’t care. For at least a little while, they were both his, and he was going to take as much of themselves as they would give him.

* * *

ISAAC

If it were possible, Isaac would give almost anything to go back in time and tell his preteen self that everything was going to be okay in a few years. The abuse wouldn’t get better for a while--in fact, it would get worse before it was over. But someday soon, he’d have power, he’d have friends, and he’d have the boy with the buzzcut and the smile that made Isaac’s heart pound and his stomach fill with butterflies whenever he saw it. He’d also have a girl so beautiful and wild that she was beyond imagination. _Just a few more years, kid. Help is on the way._

Stiles and Malia both cared about Isaac. There was no way to deny it, even though the abused boy that would probably always live inside of him didn’t trust that it could be true. Isaac thought of the look of relief on Malia’s face when he’d come back to the apartment, of how she’d been wearing his shirt just to keep his scent close, of how Stiles had brought Isaac’s jacket with them. He thought of the way Stiles and Malia had wordlessly decided that Isaac should be in the middle of the bed for their nap, of the way their limbs had protectively caged him in so he wouldn’t leave them again.

Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe there was a way, somehow, that Isaac hadn’t thought of, for no one to leave, or for them to all leave together. Maybe he could keep them. It was an absurd thought, but lying there tangled in sex-wrecked sheets with them, sated down to the marrow of his bones, nothing seemed impossible. If this moment, against all odds, could be real, then maybe, _maybe_ …

“ _God_ , I’m gonna be so sore tomorrow,” Stiles whined, but Isaac could hear the smile in his complaint.

“Good,” said Isaac.

“Oh, sure, laugh at the frail human with his bruisable muscles, you smug supernatural sonofabitch.”

“Did we hurt you?” Malia asked, and gave Stiles’s shoulder an apologetic nuzzle.

“Don’t listen to him,” Isaac said to Malia. “He’s just being a wuss.”

“Hey, it’s been a while, okay?” Stiles said with mock irritation. “Gotta get my stamina back up near were-creature standards. Especially if I’m trying to handle _two_ of you.”

“You’re the only person in the world who would bitch this much right after what Malia just did to you,” said Isaac, trying to stifle a smile. Isaac had to give credit where credit was due; Malia had definitely taken the lead among the three of them. When it was just Isaac and Malia having sex, they were pretty evenly matched, competing to see who could make the other feel the best. Adding Stiles had changed that dynamic completely.

Not that Issac was complaining. He liked being bossed around by a gorgeous girl as much as anyone--more than liked, if he was being honest--so it hadn’t been a hardship to follow Malia’s instructions while they all started to figure out how they could “work” in bed. Following Malia’s lead had helped Isaac not think about how nervous he was to be like this with Stiles and to instead just enjoy the moment. Lying there, all naked and satisfied, Isaac still felt a little of that lingering nervousness, but mostly, Isaac felt _right_. He knew himself well enough to know that the nervousness would come back eventually, but he wasn’t going to think about _eventually_ right now.

“I want a bath,” Malia declared, clearly bored by Isaac’s and Stiles’s play-sniping.

And because neither Isaac nor Stiles wanted to sit around in a sweaty post-sex mess until after Malia had finished an hour-long soak, they both got up and hastily followed her to the bathroom. Might as well see if three people could fit in that shower, right?

* * *

STILES

Stiles had been right about waking up sore the next morning. Even an experimental shifting of his limbs while lying bracketed by Isaac and Malia was enough to inform him of at least several bruises, stiff joints, and knotted muscles. He also had some hazy memories that made him fairly certain he’d find scratches on his back and at least a few bite marks at his neck and chest.

Totally worth it.

Still, that had been them being _gentle_ with Stiles. He really was going to have to step up his game. Getting fit for his internship had helped his endurance, and Stiles was planning on going for morning runs again soon now that he’d gotten over his flu and jet lag, but there were some muscles involved in sex that didn’t get toned during an average workout. 

So even though Stiles was savoring every aching, stinging reminder of the fact that yesterday afternoon hadn’t just been a fantasy, he resolved to incorporate more strength training in his workout regimen. Stiles didn’t want either of the people currently affectionately trapping him in bed to feel like they had to hold back with him. He wanted _everything_ , even if it meant a few battle scars. He’d just have to stock up on ibuprofen and Icy-Hot while he toughened up.

Belatedly, Stiles realized what had pulled him out of sleep. Fingers in his hair, blunt nails scratching against his scalp. A shiver of pleasure coursed trom Stiles’s head to his fingertips and toes. If Stiles had had the ability to purr, he would’ve done it then.

“Never stop doing that,” he managed to mumble, eyes still closed.

Contrary to his orders, the fingers stopped moving. Siles opened his eyes to find himself face-to-face with a sleepy Greek god.

“Sorry,” Isaac whispered. “Didn’t realize I was doing it.”

The corner of Stiles’s mouth quirked up. “How do you give someone a scalp massage in your sleep?”

Isaac looked almost… _sheepish_. Stiles’s smile spread a fraction as Isaac glanced away and muttered, “It’s just a thing I’ve wanted to do for a while.”

“Well, I just told you not to stop, so seems like this is a win-win.”

An amused huff through Isaac’s nose preceded his fingers beginning to move again. Stiles’s eyes slid shut again as he shivered again. He made a mental note never to reveal to Isaac that he was susceptible to ASMR, because he had a feeling that Isaac would mercilessly exploit that knowledge.

Then Isaac’s hand slid to Stiles’s neck, fingertips searching for knots and pressing gently, rubbing in small circles to break them up.

Stiles couldn’t help it; he groaned in pleasure and relief. He’d had an incredible threesome yesterday (with more than one orgasm involved by the time all was said and done), but this felt pretty damned good, too.

Apparently encouraged by the sounds Stiles was making, Isaac sat up enough that he could use both hands to massage Stiles’s shoulders.

“Jesus, Isaac,” Stiles gasped on the tail end of a shameless moan. The streak of pain-related kinkiness in Stiles was getting really into this. The knots in his shoulders were so tight that the massage genuinely hurt, but it also felt desperately _good_. “Seriously, don’t stop.”

Isaac laughed in a way that made Stiles shiver again. “Wonder if someone could come from a shoulder massage,” Isaac mused.

Stiles bit back the next groan that threatened to escape his mouth, because Isaac was getting way too cocky about the effect his hands were having on Stiles.

Luckily (maybe), Malia chose that moment to wake up and nose into the scene that had clearly become foreplay without Stiles realizing it.

“You started without me,” she said, blinking at them sleepily.

“Hey, all I did was try to help with some sore muscles,” Isaac said innocently. “How was I supposed to know he’d get off on it?”

Smug bastard.

* * *

MALIA

Though Isaac seemed to think she was teasing them, Malia was actually delighted to wake up to find Isaac and Stiles touching without her starting it. Stretching her sleep-heavy body against Stiles’s reminded her that she’d actually been able to get both boys to sleep naked this time. She’d managed to restrain herself from trying for more sex before bedtime because she knew they’d worn Stiles out that afternoon, but Isaac hadn’t protested when she’d fully undressed him just before bedtime, and Stiles had followed his lead. It had felt so good to have them all skin-to-skin, with Isaac guarding Stiles’s other side, that Malia had slept deeply all through the night.

“He has this thing with his head and his neck and ears and stuff,” Malia explained. She’d found the word for it online once but her sleepy brain couldn’t remember it. “It’s fun.”

“Traitor,” said Stiles, even though he was clearly enjoying the way Isaac was pressing his knuckles along his spine. Malia nipped his ear with her teeth and he made a sharp sound that was part surprise, part pleasure.

“ _Really._ ” Isaac asked, but it didn’t really sound like a question, and he was grinning down at Stiles.

Malia sat up enough that she could see the scratches she’d left across Stiles’s back. She didn’t feel bad because she remembered how he’d told her he liked them when she’d first done it by accident, but it was strange to see them after having sex with Isaac for so long; she still scratched Isaac--harder than she scratched Stiles, really--but he healed much faster.

There was so much she was remembering about Stiles now that she could touch him again. It had been so much fun learning all of these things about Stiles’s body that nobody else had known, and using them to play with him and make him feel good. She--

Hang on. Malia knew all of these things about Stiles that Isaac didn’t know. That didn’t seem fair. She frowned to herself.

Stiles made a sound of protest, and Malia realized it was because Isaac had stopped touching him.

“What’s wrong?” Isaac asked Malia.

“It’s not fair.”

Stiles shifted so he could look at her. “We didn’t mean to start anything without you. Isaac was just trying to help because my muscles are stiff.”

“It’s not that,” said Malia, shaking her head for emphasis. “I don’t mind if you play without me. I want to watch sometime, actually.”

She must’ve said something odd, because both boys’ faces turned pink and they stared at her. Malia continued before they could interrupt: “That’s the thing, though. You haven’t had sex without me. I’ve been with both of you on your own and all together. It’s not fair that you guys haven’t done it alone.”

 _That_ was the solution to all of the awkwardness, Malia realized. When she was with Isaac and Stiles, they could focus on her instead of each other, just like they’d talked to her but not each other when they hadn’t wanted to admit how they’d felt. They might eventually get comfortable during sex with each other when Malia was around--they’d made progress, after all--but if she wasn’t there, they’d _have_ to get used it, and then it wouldn’t be awkward anymore. It would solve everything!

“Fairness doesn’t matter here,” said Isaac. “We both like being with you.”

Malia shook her head. She knew she was right about this. “You guys are still being weird with each other and it’s because I’m here.”

“Malia--” Stiles started, as Isaac said, “That’s not--”

But Malia cut them off: “It’ll be good for all of us.” She grinned at them as she bounded out of bed, excited to give them time alone so the weirdness would be gone soon. She really did want to watch sometime, but that could wait.

“Whaaat is happening,” she heard Stiles say from behind her as she went to the bathroom to brush her teeth.

“Fuck,” was all Isaac said in response before Malia shut the bathroom door and started getting ready to go enjoy Paris on her own for a few hours.

* * *

ISAAC

“Is she seriously doing what it looks like she’s doing?”

“Yup,” said Isaac, wondering how long it was going to take Stiles to accept their fate.

“She’s gotta be joking.”

“Nope.”

“So her plan is…?”

“To go play tourist and leave us here to fuck while she’s gone,” said Isaac. He was almost in awe as he said the words, because literally no one in the world except Malia could make that plan sound completely logical.

“What if we don’t?” Stiles was eyeing the bathroom door warily, probably worried that Malia could hear him suggesting they disobey her. Isaac could hear the sink running though, so probably not.

Isaac shrugged. “She’ll probably scold us and then leave again for another couple of hours. Repeat until we get it right.”

Stiles paused, thinking. “How would she know if we--”

“She’d know.”

“Yeah.” Stiles heaved a sigh and rolled onto his back. “She really would.”

“Guess we’re screwed then,” said Isaac.

“Or we will be,” Stiles said with a snerk.

“At least one of us, anyway,” Isaac countered, making it both a threat and an invitation.

Stiles’s face flushed, but he gave Isaac a defiant look and said, “Malia wants it to be fair.”

“Smartass,” said Isaac, because the more he pictured the scene they were sketching out for themselves, the harder it was to think.

Malia emerged from the bathroom, still naked but fresh-faced, singing a recent pop hit to herself (and getting half the lyrics wrong) as she hunted down the pieces to whatever mismatched outfit she was planning for her outing.

“It’s cold out,” Isaac called over to her, because he knew there would be no dissuading her from her plan.

“ _It’s cold out_?” Stiles hissed at him. “ _That’s_ how you’re going to convince her not to go?”

Isaac raised an eyebrow at Stiles. “You actually think there’s a way to convince her not to go?”

Stiles opened his mouth as if to speak, but ended up just gaping at Isaac, then closing it again. They both watched Malia in fascinated silence as she moved back and forth between the bathroom and other rooms of the apartment gathering up clothing and her boots, still singing to herself.

When she finally came to a fully-dressed stop back in their bedroom, she was wearing the same T-shirt she’d stolen from Isaac yesterday--one of Cam’s old Army shirts, worn soft from many washings and bearing several holes that showed its age--on top of which she’d layered one of Stiles’s flannel shirts and the leather jacket Isaac had bought just after he’d been made a werewolf. She was wearing those ridiculous shorts yet again, but she had tights on underneath them, plus socks that reached her knees, and her boots. The overall effect was ridiculous, but it was also perfect.

“See, I’m warm,” she declared from her position standing at the foot of the bed. “I’m gonna get breakfast and visit that bookstore with all the comics. Call me when you’re done and I’ll bring you lunch.”

Stiles just blinked at her, clearly at a loss for words.

“Okay,” said Isaac, because he knew there was nothing else to say. When Malia made up her mind, that was it. She’d shown them both as much many times.

Malia crossed to the side of the bed closest to Stiles and leaned in to kiss him on the cheek. Then she went around to Isaac’s side and did the same.

“Have fun!” she said cheerily, waving goodbye.

And then she was gone.

The two of them were left sitting naked in bed together, staring at the bedroom door.

“God, I always loved when she wore my clothes,” Stiles finally said after about a minute of awkward silence. “Y’know, with your and my high school fashion combined she looks like a grunge rocker’s wet dream.”

“Almost didn’t keep that jacket when I moved here,” Isaac admitted, because it was true. He’d had a difficult time deciding which of his few possessions would make him remember things he’d rather forget. In the end, he’d only decided to bring it because he knew Paris would be colder than California and he didn’t have another jacket. As soon as he’d bought his peacoat, he’d put the leather jacket in his closet and left it there. For Malia to find, apparently.

“That would’ve been a tragedy,” said Stiles. “That jacket... got my attention.”

Surprised, Issaac finally found the nerve to look over at Stiles. “Yeah?”

“Dude, my dad’s in law enforcement,” Stiles said with a snort. “Rebels and badasses are basically my kryptonite. Half of my obsession with Lydia was because I knew she could chew me up and spit me out without blinking, and, I mean, you know Malia.”

Isaac bit back a grin, because it wasn’t as fun if Stiles knew how funny Isaac found him all the time. Instead, he kept a straight face and raised one of his eyebrows. “You’re saying you’ve got a thing for bad boys?”

“A little reductive, but in your case, yeah,” Stiles said with a shrug. “When’d I get _your_ attention?”

“Uh…” Isaac shifted awkwardly and looked away again. He’d known this conversation would probably happen eventually. He’d just hoped it wouldn’t be so soon. Still, if not now, when? There was an end date on their time together, and they both knew it. Might as well bite the wolfsbane bullet.

“Remember that class trip we took to those cabins, where we were supposed to do all these outdoor things but it rained for three days?” Isaac focused on a pillow that had somehow made its way to the foot of the bed rather than looking at Stiles. “You and Scott and I bunked with Danny, Jackson, and a few other guys, and we were stuck inside almost the whole time except for meals.”

Though he couldn’t see Stiles’s face, Isaac could feel Stiles’s eyes on him. “Isaac, that… that was fifth grade.”

“You and I both had top bunks across from each other,” Isaac rushed on, because it was too late to stop now, “and you and Scott sat up there playing on Gameboys even though you weren’t supposed to bring them. You had this, like… this super intense look of concentration, where your eyebrows were all scrunched together, and then every now and then something good would happen and your whole face lit up and you grinned and did this weird little victory wiggle because you couldn’t dance sitting down.” Isaac took a deep breath and sighed it out, letting the warmth of that memory fill him up. “And I just thought…”

“What?” Stiles asked when Isaac didn’t continue. His voice was low, almost a whisper, even though no one else was there to hear them.

Buoyed by the purity of that moment that he’d held so close to his heart for so long, Isaac finally found the courage to look at Stiles’s face. “I just suddenly thought, ‘I hope it never stops raining so I can watch him all day.’”

A few long seconds of silence, and then Stiles let out a slow breath. “Jesus, Isaac… _Fifth grade_.”

“I know,” said Isaac, cheeks flushing hot. The instinct inside him that had developed during years of abuse was causing Isaac to hunch in on himself, unconsciously preparing to take a hit, if only an emotional one. “Pretty pathetic, huh?”

“ _Pathetic_?” Stiles gaped at him. “No, dude, that’s-- Wow. How could you crush on such an obnoxious, awkward nerd for that long?”

Isaac shrugged, though his heart was beating hard, half with nervousness, half with relief that Stiles hadn’t rejected him. “Bad taste, I guess.”

“Damn.” Stiles looked genuinely stunned.

“I made this weird,” Isaac said quickly. Maybe this hadn’t been the time to reveal the length and depth of his crush on Stiles, after all. He didn’t regret it, exactly, but he also wasn’t sure how to deal with the seriousness with which Stiles was taking it. “That’s the opposite of what Malia wanted. Forget I said anything.”

“Nonono, hey.” Stiles pressed his palm to Isaac’s jaw to angle his head toward Stiles. “Don’t shut me out. I’m sorry. Whatever you’re feeling, we can figure it out.”

Isaac couldn’t help but close his eyes and lean into the warmth of Stiles’s hand, even as he shook his head helplessly. Even this simple contact was something Isaac had longed for since he’d been a kid. Longer than he’d wanted sex. “I don’t… I don’t even know what I’m feeling. It’s just… a lot.”

Stiles laughed, and the sound startled Isaac. “You wanna talk about _a lot_? The hottest dude I’ve ever met has apparently been crushing on me since we were kids and I never knew. That’s like, pre-puberty crushing. I thought fantasizing about you for over a year was a long time, but this… How’m I ever gonna live up to what I must be like in your head?”

Those words made Isaac look at Stiles again. _Really_ look at him. He was smiling, but there was something else in his face, in his voice. Something that told Isaac that this wasn’t a time when he could counter with a joke or a sarcastic comment.

Anxious to leave Stiles in no doubt, Isaac dipped his head and kissed him, hot and deep and with all the passion and longing he’d been throttling for years. It was lips and tongues and teeth, Isaac’s hands bracketing Stiles’s jaw, Stiles’s fingers clutching Isaac’s hair. And when they broke apart, gasping, Isaac continued to hold Stiles’s face in his hands, determinedly keeping eye contact.

“You’re better,” he said firmly. “Okay?”

Stiles only blinked at him, swallowed, breathed.

“Any fantasy, anything I thought…” Isaac shook his head, struggling for words. This was so much harder than sex, so much more important. “You’re already better.”

“But we haven’t even…” Stiles’s cheeks flushed red and warm beneath Isaac’s thumbs.

“Then maybe Malia’s right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the slightly late update; things just keep getting more hectic for both of us. Thank you for reading and kudos-ing and commenting!


	14. Le meilleur n'en vaut rien / Bad is the Best Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Isaac and Stiles do as they're told and Malia gets some exercise.

STILES

It usually started with an argument. They’d be fighting over something stupid, both certain that they were right, both sure that winning _mattered_ , until suddenly it didn’t. Somehow they’d be kissing, Stiles pressed up against something--a wall, a bed, his Jeep--with Isaac kissing him like it was the most important thing in the world. Like _Stiles_ was important. Because _that_ , that _importance_ , was the linchpin for Stiles’s fantasies. 

In his head, there was always a slight danger to it, the way Isaac kissed. Fingers fisted tightly in Stiles’s hair, blunt human nails raking down Stiles’s back or chest, teeth that were a little too sharp nipping at his lips or neck, Isaac’s full weight pinning Stiles down. It was always exactly enough to remind Stiles how fragile he was compared to Isaac, how much _strength_ Isaac was keeping in check just to make Stiles feel so, _so_ good. 

But for some reason, Stiles could never touch dream-Isaac back, or if he did, he could never remember that part of the dream in the morning. He wanted to know if Isaac’s curls were really as soft as they looked. He wanted to know where Isaac was sensitive, if he was ticklish, what it would take to make him lose control.

Control had always been a source of anxiety for Stiles. Hell, his inability to control his own fidgeting from an early age had led to scolding and teasing and medication. Since the Nogitsune, though, control was everything. When control slips, chaos rises. The Isaac of Stiles’s dreams was a chaos Stiles welcomed.

And yet, though dream-Isaac could touch Stiles, could _take_ him, dream-Stiles couldn’t do the same. Stiles supposed that was his brain’s way of coping with Isaac’s lack of attainability: Isaac is metaphorically out of reach, therefore Stiles literally cannot touch him. Dream logic being unfairly in line with awake logic.

If the dreams had ever gone the way Stiles actually wanted them to--the way he’d fantasized about, spending hours analyzing and planning every detail thanks to his hyperfocus--it would’ve been Stiles pinning Isaac down, holding him in check when Isaac pushed up for a kiss. Werewolf strength couldn’t stop Stiles in his fantasies. Stiles would touch every inch of Isaac until Isaac was begging Stiles for more, until he was an inarticulate mess, until Stiles couldn’t stop himself.

Until the chaos that had never really left Stiles slipped the leash. Until he dragged Isaac into that chaos and they had to fight their way back from the edge together.

If their arguing was foreplay--and, let’s be real, it absolutely was--Stiles imagined sex with Isaac as a battle. One he was determined to win in his fantasies but never really minded losing in his dreams. (Not the healthiest way of thinking about romantic involvement with another person, maybe, but the bar for well-adjusted relationships in Beacon Hills was pretty damned low, so Stiles figured he was probably fine.)

Actual sex with Isaac had so far been nothing like Stiles had imagined. Mostly because Stiles didn’t know where to start. That was never a problem in his fantasies. He would just go for it. Or he’d start someplace in the middle. And if he didn’t know where to start in his dreams, it was okay, because Isaac was doing enough starting for the both of them.

But despite lying naked in bed, in this very real moment that was neither dream nor fantasy, with the object of a significant portion of his imagined sexual encounters, Stiles couldn’t stop thinking about how his own crush on Isaac sounded so shallow after what Isaac had just shared.

Stiles wanted to assure Isaac that his crack about the jacket had just been a joke, even though it was sort of true, in a way. Stiles had liked Lydia for so long (well, the idea of her, at least) that he hadn’t even been able to consciously think about liking anyone else unless they made it clear that they were interested in him first. Kissing Heather at her birthday party never would’ve happened if she hadn’t made a move, for example. So it hadn’t been until after the blacklight party at Derek’s loft--when Stiles had had an honest-to-God Eureka moment that he might like boys as well as girls--that he’d even considered how much he’d been flirting with Isaac. How Isaac might’ve been flirting back.

(The irony was not lost on Stiles that kissing a girl had led to him realizing he might want to kiss a boy. One innocent, two-word question--“Do you?”--had simultaneously shattered his sense of identity and brought everything into sudden clarity. Because yes, he did. He really did like boys. Or at least one of them.)

Even before the unconscious flirting, there had been all the time Stiles had unintentionally spent with Isaac over those few months after Derek had started building his pack, seeing him change from wallflower Isaac to asshole-in-a-leather-jacket Isaac to scarves-and-bitchy-banter Isaac as he finally had a chance to figure out who he was as a person, and it was no wonder that Stiles hadn’t been able to pin down how he’d felt. Isaac had been too much of a shifting enigma, an annoyance, a competitor, to be a source of conscious attraction for Stiles.

But with junior year had come focus. Scott had become an alpha, so an obnoxious, infuriating beta had become their constant companion. An obnoxious, infuriating _boy_. And Stiles liked boys. _Do you?_ Yes, he liked boys. He liked _this_ boy. And this boy had found his way into Stiles’s teenage fantasies, filling the space left by the girl who had become a trusted friend rather than an object of desire while Stiles hadn’t been paying attention. Isaac had sneaked in and taken up residence, expanding the space. Transforming it into something new. Something real and exciting and dangerous.

There were so many things Stiles wanted to say to Isaac, so many justifications he could’ve made, for not _seeing_ Isaac sooner, for sitting at home mooning over a girl who would never be his when there was a boy sitting alone in his own home, mooning over Stiles. A boy who was being abused and controlled. A boy for whom the thought of Stiles had probably been a source of consolation.

Stiles couldn’t say anything about that. Apologies would ruin whatever this moment was building to. So instead, he promised himself that no matter what happened after Paris, he was Isaac’s until Isaac didn’t want him anymore. He’d already made a similar promise yesterday, in his head, to belong to the girl who had once promised never to leave him behind.

The fact that, after everything they’d all been through together and separately, they’d ended up here, was nothing short of a miracle. Better than a dream. Better than a fantasy. _You’re already better_.

_Then maybe Malia’s right._

Stiles tangled his fingers in the soft curls behind Isaac’s ear and kissed him. This was a dream he could touch.

* * *

ISAAC

It was. It _was_ better than any fantasy.

Stiles and Malia and Isaac. 

Yesterday had been more than Isaac could ever have expected. Despite some of the awkwardness between him and Stiles, it had still been an incredibly powerful and personal experience. But given the awkwardness, Isaac had done his best to prepare himself mentally and emotionally for the possibility that there might always be a wall between him and Stiles. He’d been ready to accept that and treasure the bits of Stiles that shone through the cracks. If Stiles had only really wanted Malia, Isaac could’ve lived with it. It had been the most likely outcome, and it would probably be for the best.

And then Malia had worn his jacket, and Stiles had made a joke, and Isaac had confessed a secret he’d kept locked away for safekeeping since fifth grade.

 _Jesus, Isaac…_ fifth grade _._

_Nonono, hey. Don’t shut me out._

Isaac wouldn’t shut Stiles out anymore. Not because he didn’t want to, but because he _couldn’t_. It would be easier, safer, if the wall stayed up. But it was down now, bashed into a thousand pieces by Isaac’s ill-advised confession and Stiles’s acceptance of it.

(To be fair, though, a very stubborn girl had clawed some cracks in it first.)

“She’s always right, huh?” Isaac mused between kisses. Stiles’s fingers were gripping his hair in a way that made the wolf inside him growl with pleasure.

“Yeah,” said Stiles, moving his mouth to Isaac’s neck. “It’s annoying as fuck sometimes.”

“Starting to--” Isaac’s breath hitched when Stiles sank his blunt human teeth into the skin near Isaac’s throat. “Starting to get that.”

Stiles kissed the spot he’d bitten, like an unspoken apology. It made a shiver of pleasure course through Isaac’s body. He braced his hand on Stiles’s ribs to hold himself steady, and Stiles’s body flinched and stiffened slightly.

“Ticklish?” Isaac asked him.

“Yeah,” said Stiles, then pressed a kiss to Isaac’s collarbone. “But also, uh.” Another kiss, a few inches closer to Isaac’s shoulder.

When Stiles didn’t finish the thought, Isaac asked, “Also what?” And when Stiles only shrugged, Isaac nudged Stiles’s chin up with his knuckles and repeated, “What?”

Stiles’s cheeks were pink, and his eyes darted away from Isaac’s.

“Okay, so, here’s the deal,” Stiles finally said. “I know how to do this. Like, I’ve watched a lot of porn--and I mean, a _lot_ of porn--and read a bunch of articles and stuff, so I actually know a bunch of different ways to do this. But…” Stiles’s eyes met Isaac’s for a split second before darting away again.

“But?” Isaac asked patiently, because he was pretty sure he knew where this was going, and he didn’t want to scare Stiles off. (Okay, fine, it was because he kind of wanted to make Stiles squirm.)

“But I’m _technically_ still a gay virgin, so--”

Isaac couldn’t help it; he burst into a fit of laughter before Stiles could finish his sentence.

“Hey!” Stiles looked back up at Isaac, eyes narrowed. “I’m baring my soul here, dickhead.”

Still laughing, Isaac managed to gasp out, “Baring your _soul_? You’re just trying to tell me you’ve never fucked a guy before. Like I didn’t already figure that.”

“Uh, _rude_.” Stiles poked Isaac in the chest. “How’d you know?”

Isaac shrugged, because he actually couldn’t really explain how he knew. Something about who Stiles was, something about how Stiles interacted with people. Maybe Isaac hadn’t known for sure, but he would’ve been surprised if he’d been wrong.

“Fine, Mr. Gaydar,” Stiles said irritably, “what about you?”

In Isaac’s fantasies, Stiles would’ve been his first. From about age eleven to fourteen, Isaac had let himself believe that it might be a possibility, however unlikely. But then his life had become enough of a hell to crush any thoughts about pursuing a romantic or sexual relationship, and then there had been Allison, and then Allison was gone, and Isaac had moved to Paris to learn how to forget. It turned out that sex with people you didn’t know very well was a pretty effective way to forget for a while. He hadn’t done it often, but he’d done it more than once.

Was it a bummer that Isaac had wasted that on someone he didn’t care about when he could’ve waited for Stiles? Sure. But on the plus side, now he got to lord his experience over the adorably affronted “gay virgin” in bed with him.

“Not so much,” said Isaac. “I mean, Paris, right? Malia was only here for like a week before we hooked up, and look what happened to you.”

Stiles rolled his eyes. “So, what, you were taking a nice stroll past the Louvre, minding your own business, and the next thing you know you’re in some French dude’s bed?”

“That’d be ridiculous,” Isaac replied, deadpan. “It was the Arc de Triomphe, and the dude was Italian.”

The degree to which Stiles fought not to laugh made Isaac’s own mouth spread into an involuntary grin. The tension was gone. Isaac’s hand slid from Stiles’s ribs to his hip, and Stiles leaned into his touch this time rather than flinching away.

“All right, Casanova,” Stiles murmured as he leaned in to kiss Isaac again. “Show me the ropes.”

* * *

MALIA

Malia was glad she’d remembered to grab her guidebook on her way out of the apartment. She’d pretty much stopped using it to find things to do as she had gotten more familiar with Paris, but it had still been useful for keeping notes about all her favorite places.

Sitting at a café, Malia dunked pieces of buttery croissant in hot chocolate and flipped through the book, trying to decide how to spend the next few hours. Since she didn’t know how long the boys were going to be--mostly she didn’t know how stubborn they were going to be about this--she didn’t want to do anything that would take her too far away from the apartment. That ruled out any day trips leaving the city that she hadn’t gotten to yet. River cruises were only supposed to take an hour or two, but the reason she hadn’t taken one yet was because it didn’t seem like it would be much fun without someone to talk to. 

Despite Isaac spending his weekends with Malia and then her getting to show Stiles around a little once he’d recovered from the flu, Malia had spent most of her days exploring Paris alone. She didn’t mind, because that’s what she’d expected when she’d left Beacon Hills in the first place, but it was still nice to have company for certain things. 

Besides, Isaac had told her a lot of the cruises tended to be romantic, especially the small boats. Malia didn’t care either way, but she wasn’t sure if Isaac had meant “romantic” in a good or a bad way, so she hadn’t brought it up to him again. That had been before they’d kissed though, so maybe he’d be more interested now. Especially with Stiles there. She made a note in the front of her book to ask them if that was something they might want to do before they left Paris.

Malia couldn’t wait for Isaac’s finals to be over, then she could ask him where he’d want to travel without worrying about distracting him. Stiles might have some ideas, too. He knew about way more places in the world than Malia did. Between them, Malia was sure they’d find someplace incredible to explore together next.

Even though she’d already spent several days wandering the big park her guidebook called the Bois de Vincennes, that was eventually where Malia settled on going. A park wasn’t the same thing as the woods, but it felt good to be around so many trees in the middle of the city. She could walk to the park in about an hour, spend another hour walking around the nature trails, and then when the boys called she’d be near several places where she could get them all lunch to bring home. After all, if they’d done things right, they’d be hungry and too tired to cook something.

The thought of Isaac and Stiles finally having that connection made Malia smile to herself. It had been so much fun being with both of them yesterday. Hopefully next time all of the awkwardness would be gone. And Malia could watch Isaac and Stiles have sex, which she very much wanted to do. The only problem now was that she’d have to be patient about it, because Isaac would probably want to study before they played again, and as annoying as Malia found that, she did want Isaac to do well in school because she knew it was important to him.

Maybe she and Stiles could take a nap while Isaac studied. Then dinner, then sex. Malia started humming a happy song to herself as she entered the park.

* * *

STILES

Stiles rolled over onto his stomach with a groan of satisfaction.

“Fuck,” he managed to gasp out. “Do you have that Italian dude’s number? I feel like I should send him flowers or something.”

A huff of closed-mouthed laughter from Isaac, who was sprawled on his back next to Stiles, breathing hard. Stiles indulged in a smug smile at the fact that he’d managed to make a werewolf breathless.

“I’m sure he’d be happy I paid it forward.”

“ _Yeah_ , ya did,” Stiles said on a giggle. He couldn’t help it; his nerves were buzzing.

Isaac shifted onto his side to face Stiles. A warm hand smoothed over his back and shoulders, deft fingers finding knotted muscles and rubbing at them gently, like when they’d woken up together. Stiles didn’t even try to hold back his moan of relief. Sex with supernatural creatures was amazing, but it was also hard work.

To Stiles’s surprise, Isaac didn’t give him shit for the moaning. He just kept moving his hands over Stiles’s skin, easing the tension in his muscles, tracing along the stinging scratches from Malia’s fingernails. Within minutes, all of the pain had melted into pleasure, leaving Stiles boneless and utterly content.

Hang on. All of the pain.

Stiles opened one eye and caught hold of Isaac’s wrist, craning his neck to peer at Isaac’s inner arm. As he’d suspected, he caught a glimpse of black in the veins there just before it faded.

“Cheater,” Stiles teased lazily.

“You complaining?” Isaac quirked an eyebrow at him.

Stiles tried to shake his head, but it was too heavy. His forehead dropped back onto the pillow despite his best efforts to keep his head up. “Just sayin’. Plus you don’t need to hurt ’cause of me.”

Something in Isaac’s expression softened. Instead of responding, he pushed Stiles’s face back down into the pillow with one hand and found a stubbornly persistent knot near Stiles’s shoulder blade and pressed into it with the other hand. Stiles laughed but didn’t resist. 

As Isaac rubbed the muscle, Stiles could literally feel Isaac drawing out the pain now that he was aware of it. Stiles had seen werewolves take pain before. Even more so than superhuman hearing, that was the wolf ability that Stiles had truly envied: the power to actually make someone’s life a little easier, if only temporarily. The power to take away suffering. But fate, being the bitch that it was, had answered Stiles’s silent “I wish I could take pain without being a werewolf” plea with a monkey’s-paw-styled solution: it had sent him the Nogitsune. The thing that had lived inside Stiles had had an endless hunger for others’ pain, and when they weren’t hurting enough on their own, it had hurt them to make more.

Stiles squeezed his eyes shut, keeping his face hidden in the pillow and trying to focus on Isaac’s hands. He didn’t want the ugliness of the Nogitsune’s twisted inversion of pain-taking to taint this precious, fragile moment. The chaos was an undeniable part of Stiles. It had changed him. But whoever he was now, he was in bed with a person whose every touch told Stiles that he was cared for, that he was wanted, that he was forgiven.

So Stiles turned his head, opened his eyes, and clung to the version of himself who had found his way to Isaac and back to Malia. The version of himself who wanted to return every favor and learn every trick that Isaac was willing to teach him, again and again and again.

Stiles was about to say exactly what he was prepared to do to Isaac provided that he never, ever stopped massaging his back, until he noticed Isaac’s eyelids flutter shut as black jumped up his arm. Stiles knew that expression on Isaac’s face now, and it wasn’t pain. A sudden realization sparked in Stiles’s sex-addled brain and he propped himself up on his forearms, staring at Isaac.

“Oh, my God.”

Isaac’s eyes snapped open and he regarded Stiles warily, but said nothing.

“It’s a kink,” said Stiles, a smile spreading across his lips.

Isaac’s cheeks immediately pinked, though his tone remained impassive. “What?”

“It’s a _kink_ ,” Stiles repeated. He sat up in bed and gaped at Isaac. “Shit, dude, you’ve literally invented a kink that only works for werewolves.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Isaac, but he was refusing to meet Stiles’s eyes.

“You like taking pain,” Stiles insisted.

“I like making people feel better, yeah,” said Isaac, a note of defensiveness in his tone. “That's not news.”

“No,” Stiles said firmly, because he knew he was right about this. “You _like_ taking pain. Like, _really_ like it.”

The way Isaac’s cheeks flushed darker confirmed the truth.

“Dude, why didn’t you say something?”

Isaac glanced up at Stiles as if surprised by Stiles’s reaction. “Uh, because it’s weird and kind of fucked up?”

Stiles snorted, dismissing Isaac’s awkwardness. “It’s fucking _hot_ is what it is.”

The look of cautious incredulity on Isaac’s face was fucking _adorable_. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No way, man,” said Stiles. “First off, I’m not here to yuck anyone’s yum or whatever. Second, this is actually kinda perfect.”

Isaac’s eyebrows knitted. “Perfect for what?”

Stiles rolled his eyes, because seriously, Isaac could not be that oblivious. “You think Malia would scratch me up like that if I didn’t want her to?”

Understanding finally dawned on Isaac’s face. “No. She’d stay in control so she wouldn’t hurt you.”

“Yup.” Stiles grinned excitedly, his mind buzzing with possibilities. Stiles liked being hurt (within reason, by people he trusted not to actually harm him). Isaac liked making people stop hurting.

But Isaac frowned. “Okay, fine, I like it,” he admitted. “But I… I can’t _give_ pain, okay? And I don’t want anyone doing it to me. I’m not into that. Sorry.”

“Hey, don’t apologize,” Stiles said seriously, because like hell was he going to let Isaac feel like he was disappointing Stiles in bed. “People like what they like.”

Isaac still looked cautious, but he wasn’t frowning anymore. “Okay.”

“Besides,” said Stiles. “We’ve got Malia.”

The startled laugh from Isaac defused all of the tension between them again. “Good point. You guys can break out the whips and the gags or whatever and I’ll do damage control.”

“Hey, S and M are our initials, right?” Stiles said with a smirk, then added, “Ironic, because I’m the one who’s really into the ‘M’ part.”

Isaac gave Stiles a distinct ‘I refuse to acknowledge how clever you are’ look and said nothing.

“Speaking of M,” said Stiles, “we should probably call her soon. Tell her the good news and all.”

“Right,” Isaac said conversationally. “Forgot that the first thing you’re supposed to do after sex is call the person you had a threesome with the day before.”

“Totally slipped my mind,” said Stiles. “Wanna take some pain from my arm so I can grab my phone?”

* * *

MALIA

Malia was furious with herself for letting her guard down. 

She’d gotten so used to having Isaac there to watch her back that she hadn’t been paying nearly enough attention to the other people walking the nature trail. Malia had been thinking about how nice it was to be back around trees and how maybe she could convince the boys to go camping between leaving Paris and wherever they were going next when she’d heard the heavy footfalls of someone running up behind her. Probably a jogger, she’d thought.

Because of the popularity of this trail for jogging, Malia had already been at the edge of the pathway, but something had still made her glance back just to make sure she was out of the way. Maybe something instinctive. She wasn’t sure if she’d recognized the man coming up behind her, unconsciously noticed that he was running just slightly too fast to be human, or had caught his scent without realizing, but Malia had suddenly known two things:

One: The man running towards her was a member of the werewolf pack who had attacked her and Isaac and he knew who she was.

Two: She had let the werewolf get too close, and now running away was going to be a serious problem. 

Malia’s fears about the second point were confirmed when he tackled her. They landed hard, rolling off the path and into the trees where four other werewolves were waiting for them. Malia growled but carefully didn’t flash her eyes at them, having been warned by Derek and Scott and Stiles and Chris and Isaac and basically everyone who knew her secret that it was a very, very bad idea to let anyone see her blue eyes.

The werewolf pack seemed to find Malia more amusing than anything, which only made her even angrier. If it had just been her fighting the werewolf who was now holding her down, Malia thought she might’ve stood a chance of winning, or at least injuring him enough that she could run away. But there was no way she could fight all five of them. Not alone. And they knew it.

For the first time in a long time, Malia was afraid. Not worried and frustrated like she had been the day before when Isaac had disappeared, or even nervous like she’d been boarding an airplane for the first time. She was truly scared.

But if she let herself think too hard about how scared she was, then the werewolves would smell it and see it, and she wasn’t going to let that happen.

So she snarled and fought when the werewolves pulled her to her feet and snatched away the guidebook that she’d somehow managed to hang on to. The one who’d taken it from her flipped through a few pages, laughed, then threw it off into the trees somewhere. Malia thrashed against the men holding her while another took her phone. It must’ve broken in the fall, but one of them still pocketed it. Then they bound her wrists together in a zip tie that burned her skin like it was coated in wolfsbane or something and walked her to a car waiting at the end of the trail, laughing and joking with each other in French the whole way, pretending like they weren’t kidnapping Malia in broad daylight. 

Malia asked where they were taking her, and one of them--the same man who had tackled her--said something in English about collecting the rest of her pack. Then he dug his claws into her back just a little, like he was daring her to make a run for it or call for help. Malia growled at him because she could feel where his claws had sliced holes in Isaac’s beautiful jacket, but she kept walking. She needed to keep a clear head and try to remember that the werewolves probably wouldn’t try to hurt or kill her in a public park. The important thing now was to stay alive long enough to somehow keep Stiles and Isaac from getting taken, too. 

It seemed clear to Malia that the best way to protect her pack would be to get herself free and go from there. So she let herself be shoved into the backseat of the car and sat still, pretending to cooperate while she started trying to think of escape plans.

Most of her potential plans involved changing into a coyote and surprising the werewolves, but if she did that, then she’d probably destroy Stiles’s and Isaac’s clothes, and she didn’t want to do that unless she absolutely had to. She regretted wearing Isaac’s favorite shirt. He was already going to be mad at her for getting caught. Plus if she shifted into her coyote form and was seen in public in the middle of Paris, someone might send the police after her and that could be even worse. So she dismissed ideas for escape that involved shifting, even as she kept searching for other options. No matter what she ended up doing, she knew she was only going to get one chance.

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac’s anxiety was rising with each unanswered attempt to contact Malia. They’d tried using Isaac’s phone. They’d tried Stiles’s. Then they’d tried each of them again, even though it had already become clear that Malia’s phone was off, and that further calls wouldn’t magically change that. They each left a voicemail. They each sent text messages. Half an hour passed. Another hour. Still nothing.

“She probably forgot to charge it,” said Stiles. “She does that a lot.”

And Stiles was right; Malia did often forget to charge her phone. But Stiles wasn’t quite hiding his own worry.

“Yeah,” Isaac agreed, though the logic did nothing to quiet his fears.

“Maybe she’s giving us extra time because she figures we’re both so stubborn it’d take a while to get over it.”

“Yeah,” Isaac repeated mechanically.

“Or she overestimates our stamina.”

“Yeah.”

“Hey,” said Stiles, catching Isaac by the shoulders to stop him from pacing. “This is Malia we’re talking about. She can take care of herself.”

Isaac tried to make himself agree, if only to reassure himself and Stiles, but he knew it wasn’t true. “There’s a reason I brought you here, remember?”

“It’s the middle of the day,” Stiles reasoned.

“Bad things happen to people during the day all the time,” said Isaac. He allowed himself to tug Stiles close in a silent plea for comfort.

Stiles hooked his arms beneath Isaac’s and rubbed gently at his back. “It’s okay. She’ll be okay.”

“Never should’ve let her leave,” Isaac murmured into Stiles’s shoulder. “Too busy thinking about sex to remember the danger.”

“You know her now, Isaac,” said Siles. One of his hands found Isaac’s hair and began combing through it. “You know no one _lets_ Malia do anything.”

Stiles was right, of course. Malia was a force of nature, for better or worse. No one leashed her, no one caged her. To even try to do that would be a betrayal. Isaac had learned that the hard way.

“Come on,” said Stiles when Isaac didn’t respond. “Let’s grab some TV time while no one’s here to talk over it. She’ll be home soon.”

Isaac didn’t really believe that, but he desperately wanted to. So he put his compartmentalization skills into practice and let Stiles lead him to the couch.

 _Come home_ , Isaac pleaded with Malia inside his head. _I promised I wouldn’t leave you again. Don’t you leave us now._

* * *

MALIA

It was getting late. Malia didn’t know exactly how long they’d been waiting in the car--parked around the corner, just out of sight of Chris’s apartment windows but close enough to still see the front door of the building. It had taken ages just for the spot to open up--but Stiles and Isaac had to have tried calling her by now. They would’ve realized that her phone was off, which wouldn’t have been too weird on its own considering how often she forgot to charge it, but she’d had a plan for the day. They would’ve known that she would’ve come back home after her phone had died, regardless of whether they might’ve still been having sex.

Wouldn’t they?

There was a small part of Malia that sometimes missed being on her own. Living as a coyote in the woods hadn’t been safe, or easy, but it had been better than processing what had happened to her mother and sister. What she’d done to them.

Life was simpler as the coyote.

Still, continuing to live like that wouldn’t have been worth all the things she’d gained as a human, especially the most important one: a pack.

Maybe “real” coyotes were usually loners, but no matter how much easier it would be to not need anyone else, once Malia had found a pack, she’d _wanted_ to stay. The people in her pack had changed over time, but the idea remained the same. A pack meant safety, friends, _home_. And now it meant something even more than that. It meant Isaac and Stiles and protecting each other.

Her therapist thought it was good that Malia had made friends so quickly after being found in the woods. She’d actually been surprised. Apparently, most kids who have suffered “trauma through extreme isolation” had issues adjusting to society and connecting with people. She’d told Malia and her dad during their family counseling sessions that Malia having a support network was the best thing for Malia; people she could rely on and talk to and trust to help her “fit in.” She’d been proud of Malia for building that for herself so quickly. Malia hadn’t even had to lie when she’d said it was instinct. Coyotes were masters of self-preservation.

She’d wondered sometimes if she was just using Scott and the others. Malia hadn’t really understood friendship very well at first, but she’d understood that staying together made them stronger. And she’d really liked Stiles. She’d liked Stiles before she’d joined Scott’s pack. Still, even before Stiles had lied to her about her birth father, Malia had always been ready to leave the pack if she had to. Like when she’d gone after her mother.

But being on her own after being part of a pack hadn’t felt right, and Malia had been lonely in a way she never had as a coyote. Instead of shutting down again, she’d gone back to Beacon Hills and it had been better, but something had still been missing. There had been an emptiness, a weight, that made everything just a little bit harder in ways she couldn’t explain. It wasn’t until finding Isaac in Paris that the weight had been lifted, and not until Stiles had shown up there that the emptiness had started to fill. 

They would’ve noticed she was missing by now. They’d be making a plan, just like how Stiles and Malia had agreed to go after Isaac if he wasn’t home in two hours. Stiles was the best at making plans. He would outthink the Paris werewolves and then Malia and Isaac would tear them apart. 

If these guys didn’t surprise Stiles and Isaac first. Malia’s teeth were pressing into her bottom lip, anxiety threatening to overtake her. How could Stiles and Isaac help her fight a threat they didn’t even know about? Without a way to warn her pack, Malia was just bait in a trap they couldn’t see. They’d be caught or worse before they got a chance to do whatever they were planning.

It was too much of a risk. If Malia didn’t save herself before Stiles and Isaac came looking for her, they’d all get hurt. Stiles or Isaac getting hurt was absolutely unacceptable. She’d just have to try to think like Stiles and be brave like Isaac. She’d have to be sneaky. Coyotes were sneaky. If she could be the best of all three of them together, she might stand a chance of escaping.

Only four of the five werewolves who had ambushed her in the park had fit in the car. Malia assumed the other one had been sent back to tell the rest of the pack what was going on. These four probably thought they had everything under control. That was a mistake Malia could exploit.

Malia was squeezed into the backseat between two of them, despite there really not being space for three in the weirdly small French car. The werewolf who had tackled her was in the driver’s seat and the last one, who had been in the passenger seat, was smoking a cigarette and leaning against the building behind them, keeping watch the other way.

Be sneaky, Malia. Sneaky like a coyote. Smart like Stiles. Brave like Isaac.

“I have to go to the bathroom,” she said as a plan formed in her head. Then in French, because it was one of the phrases listed in the back of her guidebook: “ _J’ai besoin d’aller aux toilettes_.”

The werewolves ignored her.

“I said--”

“We heard you,” the female werewolf on Malia’s left side said.

“...Well?”

“Hold it.”

“Yeah, here’s the thing,” said Malia, doing her best to put Isaac’s ‘I don’t care about anything so you can’t scare me’ tone into her own voice. “I lived in the woods for eight years. I’m used to going to the bathroom in all kinds of weird places. So you can either let me out for five minutes _right now_ or you can worry about how much longer we’re all going to have to sit in your stupidly small car together.”

Malia saw the looks they all shared. They weren’t sure if they believed her or not.

Good.

Isaac had made plenty of jokes about being “ugly Americans” over the last few weeks, so Malia had a pretty good idea of what these French werewolves must think of her. Hopefully it would be enough for them to lower their guard. Malia didn’t mind being underestimated. She’d learned that looking like a helpless teenage girl could be an advantage.

Deciding to fully “commit to the bit,” as Stiles would say, Malia did a wiggly little movement to indicate that she really had to pee. The werewolf on the other side of her made a kind of grossed-out face like he was thinking about how unpleasant it would be if they didn’t let her go to the bathroom.

The woman said something in French to the driver, and the other werewolf on Malia’s right side spoke up, too. They were clearly debating what to do, and Malia knew enough French words and could read their tones of voice well enough to know that her plan was working.

Finally, the female werewolf--who the others seemed to have decided should be the one to take Malia to a bathroom, probably because they were both _girls_ \--opened the car door and got out. She grabbed Malia by the wrist in a painfully strong grip, and for a few steps Malia acted like it hurt enough that she was intimidated. To be fair, it wasn’t too hard to show pain, because the wolfsbane-coated zip tie stung her skin and made her not want to move her hands or arms if she didn’t have to.

She could deal with the pain if it helped her get free, though. So once they were clear of the car, Malia yanked the werewolf’s arm up, half-shifting as she did so, and sank her teeth into the woman’s forearm. It worked; she let Malia go, swearing in French (Malia knew most of the bad words because Isaac sometimes used them) and shouting for the other werewolves to help as Malia ran as fast as her human legs would carry her toward the front door of the Argents’ apartment building. Once she’d put a decent amount of distance between herself and the car, she took a precious few seconds to stop and break the zip tie over her knee like she’d once seen in a self defense video. She’d need her hands free in a fight.

Malia roared with the voice of the coyote inside her as the plastic burned into her wrists, but she managed to get her hands free with a snap. She roared again, desperately hoping Isaac would hear her and recognize her voice. Stiles was smart enough that maybe he could convince Isaac not to come help her without a plan to avoid getting themselves hurt or caught, too.

The front door of the building opened, revealing the two people Malia cared most about in the world. Isaac had kept himself from shifting so far, but he looked furious and terrified. Stiles had Isaac’s crossbow in his hands and was aiming it at a point behind Malia’s shoulder. Malia was running as fast as she could, but she could feel someone--possibly more than one someone--behind her, gaining on her.

Despite her mentally willing Isaac to stay inside, he darted out of the building toward Malia. If she’d had time to argue, she would’ve scolded him for the way he was compromising his own safety. Instead, she let him scoop her up in his arms and sprint back toward the building. A crossbow bolt whizzed past them. Someone behind them roared in pain and anger. Stiles reloaded the crossbow.

“ _Fermé la porte!_ ” an unfamiliar voice shouted, and a man was hauling Isaac and Malia through the front door. Another man pulled Stiles inside before he could shoot the crossbow again. Then the heavy wooden doors slammed shut, locking the werewolves out.

Malia struggled to get free from Isaac’s hold, convinced that the doors weren’t strong enough to hold back that many werewolves. But then one of the two men slid a long plank of wood into two brackets on either side of the door that Malia hadn’t noticed before. An instinct inside her made her shudder and she took an involuntarily step back. So did Isaac.

“Mountain ash,” one of the men explained in a French-accented voice. “You pups ’ave gotten yourselves into a little trouble, _non_?”

“ _Merde_ ,” Isaac muttered.

“Indeed,” said the other man, whose accent didn’t seem to be as thick. “It’s been a while since we’ve had a pack of wolves storm one of our gates, so to speak. I can see why Chris asked us to keep an eye on you.”

As Stiles slung the arm that wasn’t holding the crossbow over Malia’s shoulder and gave her a protective half-hug, Isaac’s face turned guilty.

“Any chance you could keep this between us?” Isaac asked the man.

Both of the French Argents laughed.

Isaac sighed deeply. “Yeah. Figured it was a long shot.”

“If you go back to Chris’s apartment and stay there,” said the man with better English, “we’ll wait to call him until it’s tomorrow morning in California.”

Isaac didn’t look happy, but he gave him a nod and said, “Thanks.”

Malia’s wrists still burned from the zip tie and her muscles were aching, but the adrenaline coursing through her veins had her taking the stairs two at a time. She felt like she’d been robbed of a fight, even though she knew she did the right thing by running.

Stiles herded both Malia and Isaac back into the apartment like they were still in danger and he’d somehow be able to fight off four werewolves on his own if they got attacked again. By the time Stiles had locked the door behind them, Isaac was pulling Malia into a tight hug. When his fingers caught on the cuts in the back of the leather jacket, he pulled back and immediately took it off her.

The almost obsessive way Isaac checked Malia’s back for wounds almost made her tease him for worrying, but then she caught the scent of real fear on him, heard how fast his heart was beating.

“I’m okay,” she told him, and she was the one pulling him into a hug this time. “We’re all okay.”

“Jesus!” said Stiles, gently pulling one of Malia’s arms from around Isaac’s back. Examining the angry red lines on her wrists from the zip tie. “Fucking animals.”

When Isaac saw the wounds, he growled and his eyes flashed gold.

“ _Hey_ ,” Malia said firmly, looking from Isaac to Stiles and back. “I’m fine, okay? I promise.”

Isaac didn’t look convinced, and Stiles was still examining her wrists and scowling, but neither of them said anything.

“I’m also hungry,” Malia continued. “I was gonna bring you guys lunch, but obviously that didn’t work out.”

“Insult to injury,” Stiles muttered. “Assholes.”

Isaac made a snorting sound, but he nuzzled his face into Stiles’s hair. Malia could hear his pulse calming, see how comfortable they were together now, and she grinned.

“I’m gonna order us some food,” Malia decided. “And while we wait, you guys are gonna tell me about how you had sex.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are still crazy around here, but we're trying to keep posting once every weekend. Thanks for the kudos and comments! You guys are the best.


	15. Mieux vaut un présent que deux futurs / One Day Is Worth Two Tomorrows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Isaac is bad at making decisions, Stiles is bad at helping, and Malia has plans.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: This is the final full chapter of this fic. "Chapter 16" is an epilogue.

ISAAC

Stiles gave a low whistle as he held Isaac’s leather jacket up to the light and closed one eye, peering through the cuts in it that had been made by werewolf claws. The very thought made a fresh wave of fear and anger surge through Isaac, but he took a few deep breaths to work through it.

“ _Jesus_ ,” said Stiles. “Motherfuckers’re lucky they didn’t draw blood.” He lowered his arms and regarded Isaac and Malia sternly. “They _didn’t_ draw blood, right? Because after that fucked-up zip-tie trick, I’m already reconsidering my position on not murdering all of them.”

The fierce protectiveness in Stiles’s tone was unexpectedly soothing to Isaac’s inner wolf. Logically, Stiles being in favor of a suicide mission was a bad thing, but it comforted Isaac a little to know that he wasn’t the only one reacting so strongly to Malia being injured.

At Stiles’s comment, Malia--who was facing away from them at the kitchen bar using Isaac’s laptop to order three times as much food as they actually needed--tugged up the back of her (Isaac’s) shirt to show Stiles that her skin was smooth and clean.

“No blood,” she said as she turned toward Stiles. When she saw Isaac’s jacket hanging from Stiles’s hand, she frowned. She glanced at Isaac guiltily and said, “I’m really sorry about your jacket.”

Isaac gave her what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “It was basically yours anyway.”

“Such a shame,” said Stiles, holding up the jacket again and apparently regarding the two of them through one of the holes in the leather. He sounded noticeably more relaxed now. “How’s Isaac gonna pretend to be a bad boy now?”

Isaac stifled a smile that was threatening to surface even under the seriousness of their circumstances. For better or worse, Stiles had always known how to get under his skin.

“Pretend?” Isaac snorted. “You just told me like three hours ago that me being a ‘bad boy’ was basically your kryptonite.”

Stiles lowered the jacket and narrowed his eyes at Isaac. “No, I said _thinking_ you were one got my _attention_.”

Malia looked from Stiles to Isaac and heaved an exasperated sigh. “You guys having sex was supposed to make you nicer to each other!”

Isaac huffed a small laugh, both at her comment and the way it made Stiles’s cheeks pink.

“You said we had to have sex because we were, and I quote, ‘being weird with each other,’” said Stiles. “Us _not_ being nice to each other is actually the opposite of weird. Being mean is kind of our thing.”

“Smartass is right,” Isaac agreed. “Maybe sex fixed the weird, but it won’t fix the mean.”

“Makes it more fun though,” said Stiles, and since Isaac couldn’t argue with that, he cocked his head to the side and half-nodded with his shoulders raised.

Malia rolled her eyes and turned back to the laptop to finish up the order.

“Okay, food’s supposed to be here in a half hour,” she said, all smiles again. “Tell me everything!”

Isaac didn’t consider himself to be a particularly shy person, and definitely not someone who would be embarrassed to talk about sex, and yet he felt his face growing hot at the prospect of recounting what he’d done with Stiles to Malia. A glance over at Stiles showed that he was also blushing. Stiles’s mouth opened like he was about to talk, then closed, then opened again, and then he shook his head.

Malia frowned. “Was it not good?”

Stiles laughed in a way that made it sound like what Malia had asked was absurd, and then very quickly pulled her into a hug when her face seemed to say that she thought Stiles was laughing at her.

“I’m sorry,” he said, pressing a quick kiss to her temple. “It’s just…”

“It was good,” said Isaac. The words were, of course, completely useless at capturing what the experience had been like, but he added, “Really good.”

“Guy sure knows how to give a compliment,” Stiles drawled as he let Malia go after an apologetic squeeze to her shoulder.

“Hey, if you can explain it better, be my guest,” said Isaac, raising an eyebrow at Stiles and gesturing for him to go ahead.

Stiles’s blush returned, and he stammered for a moment before he threw his hands up as if to say that it was an impossible task.

“I can’t,” said Stiles. He chewed on his lower lip like he was worrying over a particularly difficult problem, thinking hard. Finally, his eyes darted to Isaac before resting on Malia again. “But we could show you, if you want.”

When Malia’s face lit up with excitement, Stiles hastily added, “ _After_ I eat.”

Malia’s responding pout made Isaac laugh. “Yeah, he might faint if we don’t get him rehydrated and full of carbs.”

“Hey,” Stiles pointed a scolding finger at Isaac, “frail human, remember? Don’t wanna wear me out if you want to do this on a regular basis.”

Stiles was trying his best to scowl, but there was a note of affection in his tone that squeezed at Isaac’s chest, making him want this, want everything--sex, bickering, sleeping together, even the awkwardness--on a ‘regular basis.’ It was an off-hand remark, but it promised a future that Isaac craved so badly it hurt. A future that seemed impossible now. Because it was time for them to go. Past time.

Maybe if the Paris werewolves had left them alone, they could’ve found a way. Stiles and Malia could’ve at least stayed a little longer. Isaac had known that they’d been on borrowed time from the moment Stiles had kissed him, that this day had been inevitable, but still, he’d allowed himself to hope.

Stupid. Like Isaac had reminded Stiles earlier when he’d been worrying about Malia, he’d brought Stiles here for a reason. _This_ was the reason. Isaac had known Malia would be leaving. He’d known Stiles would be leaving with her. He just hadn’t known how much of himself they’d be taking with him when they went.

* * *

STILES

Stiles was bone-tired and aching, exhausted in the best possible way. He and Isaac had successfully shown Malia more or less what they’d done alone, and while Stiles’s muscles had sometimes protested, he’d been motivated by how enthusiastic an audience Malia was.

Then, naturally, Malia had insisted on audience participation. Even though Stiles had eaten a reasonable amount of food before sex, he’d burned more calories than his standard workout, and was now half-sitting, half-lying on the couch eating leftovers from their late lunch and gulping down water. Malia was eating and drinking more slowly, sitting on the floor near Stiles’s side of the couch. Isaac was sitting at the other end with one of Stiles’s legs resting across his lap, sort of picking at his food.

Malia was all smiles and affection, practically fawning over Stiles as she made sure he had enough food and water. With Isaac absently rubbing a hand over Stiles’s shin as he occupied himself with his phone, and Malia sporadically smoothing down Stiles’s hair, nuzzling at his shoulder, and giving him looks of adoration, Stiles felt like a spoiled pet. It should’ve felt patronizing. It actually felt wonderful. Being a “kept human” for two gorgeous supernatural creatures could definitely have its perks.

“That was _so fun_ ,” Malia was saying for the dozenth time, practically bouncing with excitement as she offered Stiles a piece of chocolate (well, held a piece of chocolate against his lips until he opened his mouth). He let it melt on his tongue as he reached out his heavy arm to run his knuckles across Malia’s cheek. She nuzzled his hand, and he loved her so fiercely in that moment that it almost hurt.

“Glad you liked it,” he said to her with a smile, that love coloring his voice.

Stiles turned his gaze to the boy about whom Stiles’s feelings were much more complicated, more raw and dangerous, but no less meaningful. It was easy to love Malia because Malia so freely let herself be loved, and so proudly showed others that she loved them.

It was harder to love Isaac--at least in the way Stiles loved Malia--because Isaac was so guarded. While it was true that Isaac had finally begun to open up to Stiles, finally told Stiles how he felt and how long he’d felt it, it was all still so fragile. Tender like new skin over a healing wound. Earning and keeping Isaac’s trust was a process that would take time and patience.

Isaac’s eyebrows were drawn together as he stared down at his phone. After what had happened the morning of the phone calls, Stiles could guess what was going on in that curl-covered head.

“He’s not gonna call tonight,” Stiles said to Isaac. “Wanna watch TV or something?”

Isaac sort of half-shrugged, acknowledging that Stiles had said something to him, but he didn’t make any other response, and he continued to look at his phone. His free hand was resting on Stiles’s shin now, no longer moving.

“I still don’t get why it’s such a big deal,” Malia said casually. She popped a piece of chocolate into her own mouth. “Like, it was nice of the hunters to help, but I still think we could take those werewolves.”

Isaac made a sound that was halfway between a snort of derision and a humorless laugh, but he still didn’t look up from his phone.

“What?” Malia was slipping into mild petulance. “We did all right on our own that one time, and Stiles can use the crossbow.”

Stiles felt Isaac’s entire body tense beneath Stiles’s leg. _Fuck_.

When Isaac finally looked up at Malia, his eyes were cold, expression stony. “Are you hearing yourself right now?” he asked her.

Malia frowned, clearly thrown by Isaac’s tone. “I--”

“Jesus, Malia,” Isaac continued, cracks forming in the ice of his voice. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Isaac!” Stiles’s interjection was almost a reflex, prompted by a combination of horrified disbelief at Isaac’s harshness and Stiles’s own protectiveness of Malia, who looked completely stricken.

“I don’t understand,” said Malia, her voice shaking slightly. And Stiles knew how badly Isaac had confused and hurt her because she started using therapist words: “I need-- I need you to explain what you mean.”

“This is why I brought Stiles here, remember?” Isaac gestured in Stiles’s direction. “Because I was scared that _this exact thing_ was going to happen. And I was fucking _right_.”

Stiles withdrew his leg from Isaac’s lap and shifted up toward the end of the couch to be closer to Malia. “Leave her alone, Isaac,” Stiles said cautiously. “We’re all okay.”

But Isaac’s words had done their damage. Fire rose in Malia to meet Isaac’s ice.

“Right, I forgot,” she spat, “you called in a _babysitter_ without telling me, so I wouldn’t get in trouble while you were at school.”

“He was supposed to take you home!” Isaac sat up straighter, eyes glinting with fury. “I tried to tell you it wasn’t safe here, but you wouldn’t listen. You _still_ won’t listen!”

Malia’s anger snapped like a rubber band, her features shifting into hurt again in the space of a second. “You wanted me to leave?”

“Hang on,” said Stiles before Isaac could respond. Pieces were starting to click into place in his mind. He stared at Isaac, stomach sinking as realization dawned. “You weren’t planning on coming. You still aren’t.”

A distressed sound from Malia, her coyote whining. It was heartbreakingly pitiful.

When Isaac said nothing to defend himself, and the full image of Isaac’s plans grew clearer to him, Stiles continued, “God, it was _goodbye sex_. That’s what you just gave us.” His own voice was starting to feel unsteady, too. “That’s fucking _cold_ , man.”

Isaac made an angry sound and pushed himself up and away from the couch. Away from them.

Stiles felt sick, like something pure and beautiful had just been tainted. He replayed every touch, every kiss, in his mind. The way Isaac had seemed to want to lose himself in the experience. The way he seemed to be savoring it. Stiles had thought Isaac had just been trying to compartmentalize again after what had happened with the werewolves and the Argents, but now he was realizing what might’ve really been going on in Isaac’s head during those moments that, to Stiles, had felt like the beginning of something wonderful. Isaac had been telling himself that it was the last time. He’d been telling himself that it was the end.

Back when Stiles and Isaac had first kissed--not nearly as long ago as it felt--Stiles had told himself that it must’ve been real, because if his imagination could come up with what it felt like to have Malia back and to have Isaac, too, then finding out it wasn’t real would be more cruel than anything the Nogitsune had done to him. It hadn’t occurred to Stiles that something even more devastating could happen: that it would be real, and it would be beyond anything he could’ve hoped for, and then it would be over.

 _Fifth grade_. Isaac had been crushing on Stiles since they were kids. And yet a few sexual encounters later, Isaac was willing to let Stiles go. What had changed? Maybe it was exactly what Stiles had feared: he couldn’t live up to Isaac’s fantasies. Isaac had said Stiles was better, but that was before Stiles and Isaac had had sex that wasn’t focused on Malia. Stiles wouldn’t be the first person to get sweet-talked into bed and then iced out the next day. But he’d thought… And it had felt so right. Alone with Isaac and together with Malia, it had all felt so _right_.

Looked like it hadn’t felt right to Isaac, though.

Another distressed coyote sound drew Stiles from his self-pity, and he reached for Malia’s hand to try to comfort her. This was happening to her, too. To his surprise, though, she snatched it away.

“You only came here to take me _home_?”

Stiles stared at Malia for a moment, thrown by the hurt disbelief in her gaze. Slowly it dawned on him that he hadn’t actually spoken to Malia about what Isaac had asked him to do. Well, shit.

“I am _so sick_ of you guys planning things without me,” Malia said with a growl in her voice. “You said you wouldn’t do that anymore!”

“Malia--” Stiles started, but she ignored him.

“Did either of you stop for like a _second_ and think that maybe _I_ might have ideas of my own?” she asked, giving each of them an accusatory glare. “I’m not stupid. I know we can’t stay here forever. But you,” she pointed at Isaac, who was looking away from her, “thought we’d leave you behind, and you,” to Stiles, “assumed I’d just go home because you said so.”

Stiles was stunned into silence. Both he and Isaac had fucked up. They had both tried so hard to navigate this so that Malia wouldn’t get hurt, yet here they were, with Malia angrier than Stiles had ever seen her. That kind of anger only came from intense pain.

And Isaac still wouldn’t even _look_ at her. He just paced across the room and stood looking out the window with his hands twitching against his legs. For a second, Stiles thought that Malia was going to push into Isaac’s space in the corner and force a confrontation. It wouldn’t have been out of the realm of possibility, but Stiles knew that was more of a comfort move for Malia. She tended to prefer her space when she was mad.

Stiles caught a flash of icy blue as Malia turned her face away, heading for the bedroom, snarling something that he couldn’t quite hear. She’d probably called them idiots, and she would’ve been right. How could three people mess up one relationship so spectacularly?

He groaned and was about to ask Isaac the same question when he saw Isaac’s twitching hand go completely still. When Isaac turned around, his face had gone blank and his eyes were fixed on something just past Stiles. The front door.

Isaac was about to leave again.

And Stiles couldn’t let that happen. 

* * *

ISAAC

Isaac was moving towards the apartment door almost before he heard Malia’s door slam, but somehow, Stiles still got there first. 

Cheeks streaked pink in anger, Stiles blocked the door, staring at Isaac as if daring him to try to leave. Like Stiles had a snowball’s chance in hell of physically stopping a werewolf who wanted to escape.

“Isaac,” Stiles started, but Isaac didn’t want to listen. He already hated himself for saying those things to Malia. He didn’t need to hear it from Stiles, too.

“Get out of my way, Stilinski,” Isaac growled. Literally growled. As if he needed one more thing to feel like an asshole about. But Stiles didn’t even blink.

“No. No way,” Stiles said firmly. “Those assholes who took Malia are probably still out there. And even if they weren’t, I wouldn’t let you leave. We’re going to talk about this.”

“What’s there to talk about?” Isaac was clinging to his own anger because it felt better than guilt or heartache. “I was fine here by myself. The werewolves didn’t care about me until Malia showed up. They’ll leave me alone again once she’s gone.”

“You don’t know that!” Stiles insisted.

It was taking every ounce of what little courage Isaac possessed to keep himself from panicking. He could feel his legs threatening to tremble, his pulse picking up. The apartment felt too small. He was suffocating in air thick with Malia’s hurt and Stiles’s anger and the wreckage of something too wonderful for Isaac to keep.

“Move or I’ll make you move.” Isaac pushed as much threat as he could into his tone, letting his eyes glow gold for good measure. As if he could ever bring himself to harm Stiles.

“You promised you wouldn’t leave again,” said Stiles, clearly refusing to be intimidated. “You promised _her_. Remember that? If you want to walk out on me, fine, I'll deal, but she doesn't deserve this.”

Isaac’s legs were definitely shaking now, because Stiles always knew the exact thing to say. The accusation hit Isaac like a physical blow. He braced one hand against the door, above Stiles’s shoulder, to steady himself as he looked down. “You think I don’t know that?”

“Then what the fuck, Lahey?” Stiles’s voice was quieter now, and it was so much worse than yelling. A moment of hesitation when Isaac didn’t answer, and then Stiles asked a devastating question: “Is it me?”

Isaac was so taken aback that his head snapped up, eyes meeting Stiles’s.

“Because that, at least, I could understand,” Stiles continued before Isaac could respond. “Stiles couldn't live up to the hype. It sucks, but it happens.” Stiles kind of half-shrugged before squaring his shoulders. “But what you and Malia have is real, and I’m not going to let you fuck that up, especially because of me.”

Stiles’s admission that he thought Isaac didn’t care about him, combined with his selfless defense of Malia, made clear to Isaac that he’d succeeded in pushing Stiles away. Isaac had convinced the person who was everything he’d ever wanted that he wasn’t good enough for Isaac. _You’ve got it backwards_ , he desperately wanted to explain. _I’m the one who isn’t good enough_. Stiles’s stubborn heroic streak--his willingness to put Malia’s happiness before everything else--was too much to bear. Isaac could feel his resolve crumbling.

“Stiles,” Isaac started, a breath away from apologizing before he grabbed hold of a remaining shred of courage and said instead, “move.”

Stiles searched Isaac’s eyes, as if he knew what Isaac had been about to say something else. Isaac found to his horror that he couldn’t look away.

“You’re not leaving,” Stiles said calmly. “But if you can tell me one thing honestly, I’ll go instead. There’s no way Malia is going to agree to come with me, but at least it’ll be less complicated if I’m not here. So if you tell me that I was just something you needed to get out of your system, I’ll go in that room right now and pack my bag and you won’t ever have to see me again.”

Isaac stared at Stiles, stunned. He’d done it. The tricky bastard had outsmarted Isaac. Isaac had fooled himself into thinking he’d be able to push Stiles away, but in reality, Stiles had tricked Isaac into letting down his defenses. He’d known that accusing Isaac of not caring about him would throw Isaac. And now Isaac felt too raw to tell a convincing lie.

He had to say _something_. But words wouldn’t come. Stiles had called Isaac’s bluff. Isaac would never be able to convince Stiles to let him go.

Left with only one option, Isaac moved to push Stiles out of the way as gently as he could. But as his hand touched Stiles’s shoulder, Stiles suddenly gripped Isaac’s forearms.

“Malia!” Stiles shouted.

A back-up plan. Of course. Stiles _always_ had a back-up plan.

* * *

MALIA

Malia was so-- was so _frustrated_. Anger was a tight ball in her chest, and her heart hurt. The two people she loved and trusted most in the world had been making plans without her, _again_. Stiles’s plan was bad enough--taking her back home before she’d finished her traveling--but Isaac’s was unthinkable. They all belonged to each other now. Why wouldn’t Isaac believe that? Why wouldn’t he trust that Malia would never allow them to be separated?

Malia stomped around the room with heavy feet, grabbing all of the papers she’d printed out while Isaac had been taking his final exam and Stiles had been asleep, and the notes she’d made for the trip she’d thought they’d take on their adventures together. How could they not have understood that that was what she wanted?

Because they hadn’t asked, of course. They never asked her opinion on anything important.

Well, screw that!

“Malia!” Stiles shouted from the living room. He sounded alarmed.

She’d been distracted enough with her own anger that she hadn’t even been trying to listen to whatever the boys might’ve been talking about. A spike of anxiety cut through her fury. What if they were really fighting instead of play-fighting? Malia didn’t think Isaac would hurt Stiles, not on purpose, but she was still scared about what might’ve happened that could make Stiles call for her like that.

Malia snatched up all of her travel plans and threw open the bedroom door, running back out into the living room. What she found was Stiles crowded up against the front door by Isaac, both of them glaring at the other.

Taking a few seconds to set the plans on the coffee table, Malia rushed over to Stiles and Isaac and shouldered her way between them, which allowed her to shield Stiles and to help Stiles keep Isaac from leaving.

She glared up at Isaac, her worry making her angry again. “You promised, Isaac,” she said with a growl in her throat. “You can be scared or mad or whatever you’re feeling, but you don’t get to break promises.”

Isaac looked like he was going to argue, so Malia continued, “It’s my turn to make a decision, and right now I’m deciding you guys are gonna go sit on the couch and listen to me.”

Earlier, when Isaac and Stiles had been in bed together, they’d listened to her without hesitation. They’d shown and done everything she’d asked, and it had been so wonderful and fun and easy. She could feel how much they cared about her, and about each other, in every word and touch. They’d trusted each other and her, and she couldn’t figure out what had changed since then. 

Because they still weren’t moving away from the door.

“Please,” Malia couldn’t keep the whine out of her voice, and that was what finally seemed to break the tension. Without saying anything, they both went over to the couch and sat down, leaving a foot of space between them. Satisfied that neither was going to run for the door, she followed them to stand by the coffee table.

“ _There_ ,” Malia said as she leaned to spread out the books and papers so the stupid boys could see how much work she’d done, how much more she’d thought about this than they had. “I can make plans, too.”

Both Stiles and Isaac looked at her plans, wide-eyed but silent.

“We stay together,” Malia said fiercely, even as her throat felt choked. “We can go somewhere else, where it’s safer, and not go home yet.”

Stiles picked up the stack of printouts Malia had gathered on Spain and flipped through them. “Damn. This is some pretty thorough research.”

“I know,” said Malia, secretly pleased that Stiles was impressed with her work, but too annoyed at him to show it.

“This could work,” Stiles admitted as he set down the papers on Spain and picked up a map of Europe that Malia had drawn possible travel routes on. “We’d have to be careful about local supernatural creatures, but if we don’t stay in one place too long and we don’t wander off on our own at night, we should be okay.”

“Exactly,” said Malia, turning to Isaac, who was still looking over Malia’s plans but not touching anything. “It’ll be safer to keep traveling than stay here, for all of us.”

“I…” Isaac swallowed visibly and shook his head as he finally looked up at Malia. “I can’t decide this now.”

“There’s nothing to decide,” Malia insisted. “You promised you wouldn’t leave us again.”

“I’m not the one who’s leaving,” Isaac said in a cold, flat voice. But Malia knew what he was doing now.

“You’re trying to make us mad at you because you’re scared to be with us,” said Malia. Now that she knew more about Isaac’s past, she could see it so clearly. “Don’t deny it, you know I can smell fear.”

Isaac shook his head again and looked down, avoiding their eyes.

“Everyone always hurts you or leaves you,” Malia continued, “so now you’re doing that to us first.”

“It’s not like I _want_ to hurt you,” Isaac said to the floor.

Stiles shifted closer to Isaac on the couch so their knees were touching. “Then come with us.”

“Isaac,” Malia said, carefully moving to stand at Isaac’s other side, close enough that she could put a hand on his shoulder, “you belong with us. We need you.”

“I know you think that,” said Isaac. He reached up and covered Malia’s hand with his. “And it… it means a lot that you do. But it’s not true.”

“Bullshit,” said Stiles, hand gripping Isaac’s knee now. “Malia’s right. You’re just scared.”

Isaac took a slow, deep breath and sighed it out, gently removing their hands as he did so. “I’ll fuck this up. Maybe not this week, or this month, but it’ll happen. And by the time I do, I’ll have fucked it up for you guys, too. People like me…” He took another deep breath and let it out. “People like me don’t get to keep something like this. And even if that wasn’t true, there are a ton of reasons it could never work. That’s not fear, that’s a fact.”

Malia shifted her travel plans to the side so she could sit down on the coffee table, facing Isaac and Stiles. “So you’re saying you’re not scared, you’re just stupid?” she asked, because she was losing her patience with Isaac’s stubbornness.

“That’s not--”

“Yeah, let’s hear the ‘facts,’ Isaac,” said Stiles. He raised his hand and started counting down on his fingers. “Worried about school? The semester’s over and we can find a way for you to finish your degree if we don’t come back to Paris. Don’t want to go back to Beacon Hills? Malia’s got enough plans to last us weeks, maybe even months, and we can go live anywhere we want in the States when we’re done. Think it’ll make things weird with Scott or Derek or our families or something? If they don’t want us to be happy, fuck ’em.”

“You don’t mean that about your dad,” said Isaac.

“Wait, is that seriously the problem?” Stiles pressed his knuckles against Isaac’s jaw until Isaac turned his head enough to look at Stiles. “Dude, I’ll call him right now and tell him we’re all dating and then we can all enjoy listening to him give you and Malia the ‘You’d better take good care of my son’ talk.”

“We _will_ take good care of you,” said Malia, taking Stiles’s hand in hers and lacing their fingers together. She held out her other hand to Isaac. “Isaac, I need you to help me protect Stiles.”

Stiles squeezed Malia’s hand and put his other one back on Isaac’s knee. “Do you really want us to go without you?”

* * *

ISAAC

“Do you really want us to go without you?”

There was no way to lie. Isaac had made the mistake of letting Stiles and Malia get too close, see too deep. They _knew_ him, and he couldn’t make them unknow him. They knew he was scared. They knew he was trying to push them away. And they were calling him on it.

How could Isaac have let this happen? Had he learned nothing from literally every other instance of how getting close to someone had gone horribly, painfully wrong? Whenever something good entered Isaac’s life, as soon as he got attached, it was over. And every time something ended, it hurt more than the last time because Isaac was an idiot who somehow kept fooling himself into thinking that things could somehow be different for him.

It was like Stiles and Malia had become part of the kind of sick cosmic irony that Isaac had come to expect from his life: He ran away from his abusive father and ended up being rejected by his alpha. He bonded with a new alpha, a new _friend_ and ruined it by becoming attracted to his alpha’s ex. He started falling for a girl and she died in another boy’s arms after saving Isaac’s life. He moved to Paris with the girl’s father to escape the grief, but her father left Isaac alone. He got used to being on his own, even began to enjoy it, and then a new girl showed up on his doorstep unannounced. He started to care about her in ways he wasn’t prepared for, then tried to sabotage it by pushing her back toward her ex. Oh, and her ex happened to be his first and long-time crush. And just when Isaac thought he might be able to convince them to choose each other and leave him because it would be best for everyone, it turned out they both wanted him, too. Now they finally had a chance to be together, all of them, but Isaac was sitting there just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

He’d been here before, so many times. And now the two people Isaac cared most about in the world were offering him something that could make him happier than he had ever been or ever thought he could be. Which meant that, when it was over--and these things were always over eventually--it would destroy Isaac. A fall from that high would break him for good.

Honestly, Isaac had been broken before Malia had entered his life, before Stiles had stopped being a fantasy. He was still broken. He had hurt them when he’d run away. He was hurting them now. He would keep fucking up, keep hurting them, if he went with them. How could any of this ever work out? Sure, it would probably be fine while they were traveling--even if people noticed them together, they’d be strangers--but they’d have to go home eventually.

Stiles could swear all day that his dad would be happy for the three of them, but what about Malia’s dad? What about Scott and everyone else in the pack? And even _if_ everyone they cared about was fine with it, what would happen when Stiles had to get a respectable job? When Isaac tried to become a teacher? Even the most progressive employers might not be thrilled about that kind of relationship, and neither law enforcement nor the primary education sector were known for their open-mindedness.

It was an objective truth: everyone’s lives would be easier if Stiles and Malia left Isaac behind.

But here they were, asking him to come with them. Words wouldn’t come. The unbearable ache in Isaac’s chest barely allowed him to think, let alone speak. It was all he could do to keep from shaking. Trapped. Isaac felt trapped. Everyone said that relationships made you feel tied down, but loving people was the only thing that made Isaac feel free. It was why he couldn’t stop clinging to people, even though he knew it would always end. Better to feel free for a while, even if you knew it would break you to be caged again.

No one said anything for a very long time. When Isaac couldn’t take it anymore, he cautiously lifted his eyes and looked at Stiles’s face.

“Do you want us to go without you?” Stiles asked Isaac again, calm and steady.

Isaac still couldn’t speak. His throat and chest were tight. Stiles shifted his hand from Isaac’s knee and held it out instead, mirroring Malia.

“Come on, Isaac,” said Stiles, his voice almost coaxing, like Isaac was a frightened animal. The comparison wouldn’t have been entirely inappropriate. “Just tell the truth. You’ve never had a problem telling me exactly what you think before, right?”

A small smile quirked at the corner of Stiles’s mouth during his attempt to lighten the mood. Just one, barely-there smile, and Isaac’s resolve crumbled into rubble. He couldn’t do the right thing.

Instead of taking their hands, he pulled out his phone and dialed one of the few numbers in his address book. Chris picked up on the second ring.

“Hey, kid. You okay?”

“Yeah,” said Isaac, staring at the wood grain in the coffee table so he wouldn’t have to look at Stiles or Malia just yet. “Listen, you’re gonna get a call tomorrow morning from your cousins here.”

Chris paused before asking, “How am I going to feel about what my cousins will tell me?”

“Probably not great,” Isaac admitted. “But I wanted to tell you that I’m fixing it. We’re all leaving tomorrow. I’ll lock your place up and give the keys to the Argents here.”

“Where’re you going?”

Isaac’s eyes flicked from Stiles to Malia and back before he said, “Not sure yet. But I promise we’ll check in.”

“Thanks for the cryptic heads-up, I guess,” Chris said, sighing before he added, “Take care of each other, okay? I don’t trust any of you on your own. I think you’ll agree I’ve got good reason for that.”

Isaac felt the corner of his mouth twitch up. “Fair enough.”

“Talk to you soon,” said Chris, managing to make it sound like a friendly goodbye and a threat at the same time.

“Yeah,” Isaac agreed. “Bye.”

Though his heart was racing, Isaac managed to calmly set his phone on the arm of the couch. Malia would’ve been able to hear the whole conversation, Stiles at least Issaac’s side. There was no turning back now. So he just waited.

“So that’s a ‘no,’ then?” Stiles finally asked, mouth already set in a knowing smirk. “About the whole wanting-us-to-leave-you-behind thing?”

Isaac nodded warily, eyes flitting from Stiles to Malia again, but not darting away this time. Now that he was looking at them, he couldn’t stop. Didn’t want to stop. 

“No more running,” Malia insisted with a determined stare, extending her hand to Isaac again.

They both waited. Isaac’s fingers found theirs. Hands gripped his, warm and sure and steadfast.

“Don’t leave without me,” Isaac heard himself say, voice raw. “I… I want to go with you.”

_~An epilogue follows this final chapter.~_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a LONG time, hasn't it? We offer our profuse apologies, but work and life events, the holidays, and then more life events and work, forced us to set this fic aside for a while. But, at long last, we bring you the final full chapter and (to be posted just after this), epilogue to the story. We're grateful for your patience and comments during our hiatus, and we very much hope you enjoy how everything works out.


	16. Epilogue: L’amour c’est être stupide ensemble / Love Is Being Stupid Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the trio go adventuring.

INTERLUDE

As penance for making stupid decisions without consulting Malia, the boys agreed to let her take the lead on travel planning for their tour of Europe. The sacrifice was much more painful for Stiles, who was used to being the Research Guy, whereas Isaac was content to be led around. But once it became clear that Malia had good travel instincts and was very conscious of which places she thought Stiles and Isaac would and wouldn’t like, Stiles gave in and was mostly able to quash his urge to micromanage. As a reward for his self-control, Malia allowed him to see her itinerary one day in advance.

Barcelona was first. They explored the city and surrounding countryside for almost ten days before it became clear that the _lobisome_ spoken of in Galician legends had territories crossing the country to the east coast. The _lobisome_ near Barcelona were still somewhat touchy about lycanthrophy having been used as an excuse in a mid-1800s Galician serial murder trial, and therefore didn’t appreciate the presence of foreign werewolves who might cause trouble. After a close call walking back to their hotel after dinner, the trio agreed not to settle anywhere for too long.

They’d only planned to pass through Monaco on their way to Italy--correctly expecting everything to be way too expensive for them to afford to stay--until Stiles bet Isaac that he could make more money than Isaac gambling. Between the fact that Isaac could hear heartbeats and scent emotions and Stiles was excellent at reading facial expressions and fairly good at counting cards, they ended up a few thousand euros richer after a single night. They could’ve made more on their second night if Malia hadn’t gotten bored and dragged them away from the tables. Stiles ended up winning by fifteen euros, which Malia promptly spent on gelato. They didn’t cross paths with any supernatural creatures (that they knew of), but deciding that a suspicious casino owner could be just as dangerous, they moved on.

They took their time traveling through Italy, spending a night in almost every town with a hotel between Milan and Rome because Malia liked the rolling countryside after spending so long in large cities and Isaac liked the wine. Stiles didn’t mind because they also agreed to pass through Florence and Piza so that Stiles could take cliché tourist pictures for his dad.

In Rome, Stiles teased Isaac so much about the Italian guy who’d slept with Isaac in Paris that Isaac nearly pushed Stiles into a fountain. All things considered, it hadn’t been much of a threat. Even without the risk of a fine, Isaac would never have let Stiles fall, and Stiles had always known that Isaac would pull him back at the last second--something Stiles very loudly insisted just so Isaac could hear that he was telling the truth.

They caught a ferry for Greece out of Bari. The trio had meant to start somewhere on the southern coast of the country and work their way up the country like they’d worked their way down Italy, but one look at the beaches had given Malia other ideas. As soon as they got off the boat, they rented camping supplies, hiked out as far as they could away from the city, found a secluded cove, and just enjoyed being alone together for a while. Of course, alone for Malia meant never having to wear clothes, so she was particularly happy with the arrangement, but the boys couldn’t really say they minded much.

They chose Vienna for literally no other reason than because it was the next flight they could catch out of Athens when they got to the airport. Two days later they thought they were on a train to Zürich, only to be told in broken English by an amused dining car attendant that they were actually going in the wrong direction entirely, and that the train had just crossed into Poland. (Isaac’s smug “Your homeland’s calling, Mieczysław” earned him a glare from Stiles and a puzzled look from Malia, both of which Isaac solved with contrite--though still slightly smug in Stiles’s case--kisses.) A day after that, they were on a flight to Amsterdam because, according to Stiles, they couldn’t backpack through Europe and not go to Amsterdam.

It was a month and a half to the day after they’d left Paris that Isaac and Stiles finally admitted to Malia that they were ready to be done traveling for a while. Which was to say, Stiles blurted out how tired he was at a “coffee house” in Amsterdam before bursting into tears while talking about how much he missed his Jeep--at least according to Isaac. Stiles couldn’t remember the conversation well enough afterward to be sure one way or the other, but he assumed Isaac was full of shit. Either way, they came to an arrangement with Malia, and two days later, the trio were on a flight to Heathrow, having already bought their tickets back to the States, set to fly out at the end of the week. Having already packed up the apartment and sent Isaac’s few belongings ahead to Beacon Hills before they left, it felt like time to take the next step forward.

* * *

EPILOGUE

“We didn’t get to see Stonehenge,” Malia said sulkily from the window seat, having apparently grown bored of watching the baggage handlers load the cargo hold.

Stiles took her hand and laced his fingers with hers. “I promise we’ll come back someday. As long as no one tells Jackson.”

Stiles and Isaac hadn’t thought much about Malia’s decision to go to London for their agreed-upon final few days in Europe. After all, it was already sort-of on the way home, and everyone spoke English there, and Malia seemed really excited about it. She’d even promised to let the boys sleep in _and_ have afternoon naps every day. It was supposed to be a low-key way to end their travels.

Then they’d gotten off the plane and found Jackson Whittemore and Ethan Steiner, of all people, waiting for them at the baggage claim. Apparently, Malia and Lydia had coordinated so that the trio would have tour guides for their four-day London stopover--Malia reasoning that if they were going to sleep in and have naps, they needed to be efficient about seeing as much as possible.

“How come you don’t like him?” Malia asked. “He seemed okay to me. And Ethan was nice.”

Stiles sighed heavily. “Sometimes I forget you got to skip the prime bullying years.”

“Jackson was mean to you when you were kids?” Malia’s brows furrowed in concern.

“Don’t worry,” Isaac said to Malia, leaning forward so he could see her across Stiles from the aisle seat, “we know he likes guys who’re mean to him.”

“ _Darling_ ,” Stiles said with mock sweetness, emphasizing the endearment because he knew it would irritate Isaac, “I hope you’re not insinuating that I had a childhood crush on a douchebag jock lizardman.”

“Three’s a pattern, _Mieszko_ ,” Isaac countered with a nickname for Stiles’s legal name, which Isaac had enjoyed using ever since their accidental stop in Poland. To his dismay, Stiles was starting to secretly like it--something he would never, _ever_ tell Isaac. “If you count the girls, you’re there: Lydia’s always had claws, and from what I hear, Malia wasn’t warm and fuzzy toward you at the beginning.”

“I punched him because he took my coyote away from me and it made everything cold and confusing and they locked me up,” said Malia, feeling irritated and a little guilty about hitting someone who was the last person she’d ever hurt now. “I wasn’t _mean_ , I was sad and scared.”

Stiles squeezed Malia’s hand and pressed a kiss to her temple. “To be fair, Isaac helped with that whole debacle.”

“And got my ankle caught in a bear trap,” said Isaac. “Bet that hurt more than getting punched.”

“Clearly you’ve never been punched in the face by an angry were-coyote,” Stiles countered with a snort.

“No fighting on the plane,” Malia scolded. She knew Stiles and Isaac were only play-fighting, but usually if it went too far, the only ways to fix it were for one of them to walk away for a while, or by having sex, and they couldn’t really do either of those things on an airplane.

This flight wasn’t as fun as the first one she’d taken on her way to Paris. Flying across the country, there had been all different kinds of land far, far below them. Malia had watched it every time the clouds cleared, and then she’d watched the clouds when they covered her view of the ground. Except for the beginning, the view on this flight was just clouds and water, and it was very bright, and finally Malia gave up and closed the shade until they got closer to New York.

At least Stiles and Isaac were with her this time. It was so much nicer to be next to Stiles than some stranger, especially because she could put the armrest up and sit however she wanted and use his shoulder as a pillow if leaning against the window got uncomfortable. She also wouldn’t have to talk to anyone if she needed to get up to use the bathroom, which was the only thing about flying that Malia hated. She was never going on a plane without Stiles or Isaac again, Malia decided then. She hugged Stiles’s pillow against her chest and sat back in her seat with her eyes closed, fingers still twined with Stiles’s, and started planning their next big adventure.

Isaac spent the first hour of the flight trying very hard to be okay with being on an airplane. Big airplanes were easier than small ones, especially when he could get up and stand or walk for a little while without ducking his head. Still, in retrospect one of the only reasons he’d been able to handle flying from Los Angeles to Paris was that he’d been exhausted and numb from grief and guilt at the time. It had all been kind of a blur, with Isaac putting one foot in front of the other, letting Chris lead the way.

In theory, it would be easier this time. He’d managed to convince Stiles and Malia that it made sense (even though it didn’t) to fly into New York, rent a car, and then drive back to California. A week-long car ride--maybe more, if Malia got her way in terms of all the places she wanted to stop--was still better than more flying. And he’d get to have one last week alone with Stiles and Malia. One last week of hotel staff giving them confused looks when three people asked for one room with the largest bed. One last week of Malia taking them both by the hands and dragging them excitedly through museums and parks and landmarks. One last week of them being _them_ , together, before they found out what everyone back home would think about it.

It was only an eight-hour flight. Just eight hours, and then Isaac wouldn’t have to get on an airplane again for a very long time. But even though he knew that, air travel was a lot different without the haze of recent trauma, and his brain had latched on to the phrase “what everyone back home would think” and was threatening to run with it. The plane suddenly felt much smaller than it was. Isaac was fully aware of every motion and sound, every person around them on the full flight, every strange smell in the recycled air, every--

Stiles’s hand landed on Isaac’s knee, fingers squeezing gently.

“It’s okay,” Stiles murmured. “You’re okay.”

Isaac nodded stiffly, trying to get his brain to agree with Stiles. He closed his eyes, forcing his senses to search for only two heartbeats, two scents: those that belonged to the people he finally trusted not to leave him. The people he trusted most in the world.

After a few long minutes, Isaac felt Stiles shift, and then Isaac’s arm was being nudged aside so Stiles could lift the armrest that separated them. Stiles’s shoulder and arm pressed against Isaac’s, his thigh against Isaac’s thigh, warm and solid. Grounding him.

Isaac generally had complicated feelings about public displays of affection. Engaging in them jeopardized two of the major principles by which he’d lived his life for a long time: first, to never let anyone know when something or someone mattered to him, and second, to stay as invisible as possible. Overtly romantic contact with another guy was a very easy way to get noticed--even more so when that guy was engaging with overtly romantic contact with a girl at the same time. Even in the most progressive cultures, the “Wait, are they _all_ together?” look from strangers was common.

But right now, Isaac craved comfort more than he worried about drawing attention. So he lifted his arm and invited Stiles to tuck his head against Isaac’s chest, Isaac’s arm around Stiles’s shoulders, hand against his head. His fingers slid across hair that was so short and smooth it felt like puppy fur, and he smiled.

 _Man, I haven’t buzzed my head in forever_ , Stiles had said on their second day in London, after he’d seen the clippers in the bathroom at Jackson and Ethan’s place. _I looked ridiculous, but it was a lot easier to take care of. Saved a fortune on haircuts, too_.

 _I liked it_ , Isaac had said without thinking, because it was true. That “ridiculous” version of Stiles was the one Isaac had first fallen for. And as fun and convenient as it was to be able to twine his fingers in Stiles’s hair and grip it, part of him had missed the “old” Stiles. But that had been okay. He liked the “new” Stiles, too.

Which was why Isaac had been struck speechless when he’d woken from a nap to find Stiles stepping out of the hotel bathroom after a shower, almost all of his hair gone. Isaac’s smile spread at the memory. He hadn’t asked Stiles to change his hair. He never would’ve asked. And yet Stiles had heard Isaac’s casual comment, _I liked it_ , and borrowed the clippers. Who would’ve thought haircuts could be a love language?

Stiles sighed happily as Isaac’s blunt fingernails scratched pleasantly across his scalp. He loved being petted, and he loved that Isaac and Malia clearly liked doing it. He’d been taken aback by Isaac’s sudden willingness to engage in PDA, but he wasn’t going to argue. Stiles was perfectly happy to serve as Isaac’s emotional support animal for the entire flight if necessary. And he was never growing his hair out again unless his boyfriend and girlfriend asked him to.

 _Boyfriend_ and _girlfriend_. Stiles wondered if his dad had guessed yet. It wasn’t a common arrangement--or at least, definitely not common in Beacon Hills--but his dad wasn’t Sheriff for nothing. And it wasn’t like Stiles had been trying to hide it during their phone calls and messaging. He hadn’t said anything, but he also hadn’t denied anything, and his dad hadn’t asked. Neither had Scott. Stiles had tried to imagine their reactions dozens of times since the three of them had left Paris together as partners. But whatever happened, he knew the people who really cared about them would accept it. They’d have to.

Stiles hadn’t told Isaac or Malia yet, but he’d arranged with Derek to rent one of the larger apartments in the building Derek owned. He wanted it to be a surprise. He also wanted to give Isaac no opportunity to suggest that maybe things would be easier, that people wouldn’t notice as much, if they didn’t all live together. Isaac and Malia belonged to Stiles now, and he was keeping them with him. They all protected each other. And now they were going to protect each other in a three-bedroom apartment with a king-sized bed and a pretty decent view of the city. If it would make Isaac feel better, or make things easier for someone’s job, then Stiles could live with the idea that one of them would be a “roommate” in the eyes of most of the world. But Stiles was going to go to bed with both of them, and he was going to wake up with both of them, and that was final.

And he did that, every night and every morning, for their nine-day “week” of driving from New York to California. A different bed in every state, but the feeling, closing and opening his eyes, was always the same. 

“You have arrived at your destination,” said the GPS woman from Malia’s phone. They hadn’t actually needed the GPS for the past hour, but Malia liked watching their progress and marveling at how the voice knew how to tell them where to go, so she’d left it running.

Stiles turned off the engine, and at any other stop on their trip, Isaac would’ve already been halfway out of the car, stretching and taking deep breaths of fresh air. But not at this stop. Not with the powder-blue Jeep resting several feet to his right.

“Now that is a sight for sore eyes,” Stiles said with a sigh, apparently following Isaac’s gaze toward the Jeep.

“You have an almost creepily strong connection with that car,” said Isaac, because it was impossible not to tease Stiles when the opportunity presented itself.

“Roscoe’s not a _car_ ,” said Stiles, sounding like Isaac had just insulted his grandmother or something. “He’s a _Jeep_.”

“Jeeps are cars, dumbshit,” Isaac said, determinedly keeping himself from smiling, though it was difficult. Needling Stiles was way too much fun, and Isaac’s mind was grasping for anything that would allow him to avoid the fact that they were about to see Stiles’s dad.

Malia leaned forward from the back seat and flicked Isaac’s cheekbone with a scolding finger. “Don’t call your boyfriend a dumbshit, dumbass.”

“Don’t call _your_ boyfriend a dumbass, jerkwad,” Isaac countered, losing his battle with the urge to smile. 

“Hey, how come she doesn’t get called dumbshit?” Stiles complained.

“Because she’s not dumb,” said Isaac, thoroughly enjoying Stiles’s irritation.

“I had the best GPA out of all of us!”

“Still dumb,” said Isaac.

“Totally,” Malia agreed, clearly having caught on to the fact that this was a game.

Stiles glared at each of them in turn. “You guys are--”

A knock on the driver’s side window made Stiles jump and turn around.

“You kids planning on sleeping in that car?”

Malia smiled at how excited Stiles was to see his dad--so excited that he got tangled up in his seat belt while trying to take it off. She didn’t know the sheriff that well, but he’d helped her when she’d first become human again, and he was always nice to her, and he was a really good dad who wanted Stiles to be happy.  
  
Malia’s dad wanted her to be happy, too, she knew. She also knew that it was hard for him to accept that one of the things that made her happiest was freedom. From his perspective, he’d missed out on half her life. He’d thought she was dead, and that it was a miracle that she’d come home. Watching him work through those feelings had put a lot of pressure on Malia, and it had been part of why she’d wanted to get away for a while. But now she found, to her surprise, that she’d missed him. Watching Stiles hug his dad so tightly, Malia felt a pang of guilt for being impatient with hers.

She resolved to do better. Being with Stiles and Isaac, holding them all together even though it was hard sometimes, had helped Malia understand how important it was to communicate, to be honest about your feelings. There were a lot of things Malia couldn’t tell her dad about her life, because knowing about them would put him in danger. But she could tell him about her travels, and about Stiles and Isaac. And he’d be happy for her. Somehow, she knew he would.

“I missed you so much!” Stiles exclaimed as he finally let go of his dad. Malia unbuckled her seat belt and got out of the car.

“I’ve missed you too, kiddo,” said the sheriff with a smile that held so much love and pride that it made Malia smile, too.

“I was talking to Roscoe,” said Stiles, waving at his Jeep. “But sure, I missed you, Dad.”

The sheriff scowled, but he was still smiling, and he rubbed his hand roughly over Stiles’s short hair. Malia was still getting used to it, but she liked it. Most importantly, she liked that Isaac liked it, and that Stiles liked that Isaac liked it, too.

Isaac watched through the car window as Stiles’s dad pulled Malia into a hug. The familiar voice in the back of his mind whispered to him once again: _They don’t need you. They’ll be happier without you. You’ll only mess this up. You should leave now, before it gets worse_.

But Isaac had promised he wouldn’t leave. So he forced himself to get out of the car and stood quietly out of the way while Stiles’s dad asked Malia about Paris and Stiles ran his hands affectionately over the hood of his Jeep.

“This one give you any trouble in Paris, Isaac?” the sheriff called over to him, and Isaac snapped to attention. He wanted to smile and crack a joke-- _She’s exclusively trouble, sir_ \--but Isaac knew that any smile he tried to have right now would look more like a grimace, and he certainly wasn’t ready to start palling around with his boyfriend’s dad about their girlfriend.

The sheriff either didn’t pick up on Isaac’s discomfort or he was politely ignoring it as he continued, “She’s a force to be reckoned with.”

The way Stiles’s dad was beaming at Malia with open affection helped ease some of Isaac’s anxiety. The sheriff had always been kind to Isaac, tried to help him when he’d been in trouble with his dad, and again because of Derek. Isaac had very little reason to trust any adult, but if any of them was worth trying for, it was this one.

Strong arms wrapped around Isaac’s shoulders, surrounding Isaac with a scent that shared hints of Stiles’s and therefore told his inner wolf that the person touching him was safe. 

“Good to see you, kid,” Stiles’s dad said warmly, and though it took him a few long seconds, Isaac was able to lift his arms and return the hug. Noah Stilinski would die before he hurt Isaac. He would protect Isaac, would fight for him, like he would for Stiles and Malia. Isaac didn’t understand how he knew those things for sure, but they were unshakable truths. 

The sheriff, Chris Argent, Melissa McCall, hell, even Derek most of the time… The list of adults Isaac might be able to trust was quickly overtaking the list of the ones he knew he couldn’t. It would take time, and it would be hard, and he knew himself well enough to know that it would work some days but not others, but it was something. It was a start.

“Come on inside, son,” Stiles’s dad said as he let Isaac go and gave him a rough pat on the shoulder. “I was just about to get started on dinner, and if you're anything like me, you're starving just from the calories it takes to listen to Stiles talk all day.”

The sheriff headed for the house, Malia laughed loudly at the affronted look on Stiles’s face, and Isaac finally felt himself starting to relax for the first time since they’d driven past the Beacon County line. He stood in the driveway and took a long, deep breath, savoring the feeling of his muscles untensing, the tightness in his chest easing.

“You comin’?”

Isaac blinked and focused on Stiles, who cocked his head toward the front door in invitation.

“Better be!” Malia exclaimed. She took Isaac’s hand in hers and tugged him forward. A few steps, and then Stiles caught Isaac’s other hand.

“Don’t know why you were worried,” Stiles muttered as they all walked together, hand-in-hand. “My dad’s already recruiting you guys to his side.”

Isaac squeezed Stiles’s hand. “Yeah, you might’ve fucked up here, Stilinski.”

“Soon he’s gonna like you guys better than me.”

“What do you mean, soon?” Isaac bit back a smile. “You know he already likes Malia best.”

“I _am_ the best,” Malia said with a cocky grin, at which point it became harder for Isaac not to smile, and then it was impossible because Malia gave Stiles--who was trying his best to scowl--a kiss on the cheek and briefly nuzzled her face against his jaw.

Stiles heaved a dramatic sigh as he held the front door open. When she reached the threshold, Malia spun back around, letting go of Isaac’s hand so she could point a finger at him sternly, her other hand braced on her hip for added authority.

“No more running,” she said firmly, and poked him in the chest for emphasis. Malia seemed to take Isaac’s startled laugh as an agreement, because she turned on her heel and headed into the house.

When Isaac didn’t immediately follow Malia, Stiles gave him a questioning look that could’ve been asking _Aren’t you going inside?_ or _Are you going to stop running?_ or maybe both.

It didn’t really matter, though, because the answer to both was the same. Isaac let go of Stiles’s hand, causing Stiles’s eyebrows to draw together slightly before Isaac framed Stiles’s face in his hands and kissed him. It was tame compared to most of the kisses they’d shared--even chaste. But Stiles still looked dazed when they broke apart.

“Yeah?” he asked breathlessly.

Isaac let his smile out as he slung his arm over Stiles’s shoulders and led him through the door. “Yeah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We've finally finished! It's a strange feeling, especially after having to take a long hiatus so close to the end, but we wanted to do things right rather than rushing them. We hope you've enjoyed the fic as much as we enjoyed writing it. It was a pleasure to work together exploring the dynamic among this trio, who, we feel, make sense together. Thank you all for your kudos, comments, and general encouragement. We'll miss writing for you, but we hope the result is satisfying to everyone. Be well!


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